canadian finance minister unveiling the coming year, and then, a discussion from the foundation on the issue of the 2012 elections series. >> this week on "q&a," jerry and rachel libert talk about the documentary "semper fi: always faithful." >> rachel libert, why did you get involved with a film called "semper fi"? >> i was researching a completely different topic, and i met a woman. before she left the project, she

let us know that her brother was involved in a fight exposing water contamination in the marine corps, and my co-director and i were a bit skeptical, but we agreed to meet her brother, which turned out to be jerry ensminger, and we were immediately taken with the subject, and i would say for two reasons. we had seen the evidence that jerry had amassed, so there really was substance to the story, and secondly, we were taken with him. we thought there was a powerful and charismatic story, in part mental story. >> where were you located when you started this? >> in new york. >> and what your duties start? >> 2007. >> how long did it take you to do it? >> a little over four years, and i do not know that we knew that going in. you start the process, and you

do not know where they are going, and there is a faith in a documentary that you believe in the essence of something, so you have to go where life takes the story, and it could take two years. it could take 10 years. we do not know. >> let's watch a clip beginning and then come back with jerry. [video clip] >> i was making a plate of food in the kitchen, getting ready for the evening. >> at camp lejeune, the water has been linked to these cancers. >> my first thought was, is this what happened to janey? i dropped my plate right there. it was like god was saying to me, here is a glimmer of hope

that you will find your answer. >> jerry ensminger, what are you talking about there? >> when any family has parents that have a child, especially a child that is diagnosed with a long term, catastrophic illness, without exception, because i have talked to so many other families when janey was sick, when you have a chance to sit down after the shock of the diagnosis wears off, there is that nagging question, why? no exception. and i looked into her mother's family history, my family history, and no other child ever been diagnosed with cancer. >> and what year was it that she got the cancer, and when did she

die? >> she was diagnosed in 1983 and died in 1985, and that revelation on the news did not happen until 1997, three years after i had retired out of the marine corps, and all of those years, i had had that nagging question, and when i heard that, i was going into the living room with a plate of spaghetti, and the reporter on the television set what they said right there in that clip, and i dropped my plate of spaghetti right there. >> go back to when she got the cancer. what kind was it? >> acute and -- leukemia. >> where did you live at the time? >> jacksonville, north carolina. we were living off base. there was the home of camp lejeune. >> how many years did you spend in the military? >> 24.5. >> what would your rank at the end?

>> master sargeant. >> specialty? >> transport, and i was also a drill instructor. >> where did you meet your wife? >> boccabella. >> and how many kids did you have? >> three girls, all girls. >> how old are they today? >> one is 37, jessica will be 31. >> you have one other? >> janey is dead? >> you had four? >> yes, veronica. she is 23. >> you met his sister, and then you meant -- met him. what were your hurdles to get this done? >> financing in raising money was a large hurdle, cobbling together the financing, especially when these things are

unpredictable, and they drag out for so long. that is a given. beyond that, i would say specific to the film, when we first started, we were not sure how much jerry could achieve. we believed in him and his story, someone who was so loyal to the marine corps and became disillusioned and had to fight against them. that inherent story and the personal struggle, but we also had a nagging fear about, you know, so many cases of water contamination or in rental incidence are unresolved, and how much traction can one guy get when you are facing such a huge opponents such as the department of defense, ; -- my co-worker, two years in the

middle of it, we started to say jerry make traction. there were people on capitol hill. we thought, yes, there will be a story of one man persevering and one man actually achieving something in his determination, something we could structure a film around. >> after you heard that report in 1997, what were you specifically looking for? what was done to the water in jacksonville or camp lejeune that you feel led to the death of your daughter? >> initially, i started making contact with representatives at camp lejeune and the navy environmental health center, which is out of norfolk, and then i started looking into other issues where contamination had taken place, other studies that had been done, that led me to this guy, kevin costas, who

did the final investigation in massachusetts, which was made famous by the movie "a civil action." the representatives of the military that i contacted played this down extremely, told me they do not know what they are talking about, these are very minute trace amounts of these chemicals, you do not have any fear that you -- you should not have any fear or reason to believe that this is what caused your daughter's illness, and i said if that is the case, why are they talking about the childhood leukemia study? that is what they called it initially, and as time went on it, and as years went by, i said in the film that i have all of the faith and confidence in the

world that the marine corps that i had served for nearly one- quarter of a century of my life would do what is right by its people. as time went on, i started to realize that not only were they not going to do what was right by the people, they were doing everything they could possibly to do what was strong. -- wrong. they were obfuscating facts. they told many, many half- truths' and total lies. >> here is more of the documentary of which you are speaking. [video clip] >> we went for years without knowing what the truth was until the marine corps posted a bunch of documents by mistake. tom called me and told me that they had posted this website on the internet, and i said, "no kidding." i was on a dial-up computer, and i spent four weeks on end all my going through the website.

>> i started reading these things, and all of these questions came to mind. >> they did not that it very well, because let's put it this way, it was only up their for about 1.5 months, and it was taken down, but luckily, we captured the entire thing before they did. >> tell us again what was on that website, and how did get there? >> the marine corps was, from what i understand, the national science foundation directed the marine corps to pose these documents in a library on their website, because it had "nsf" at the end of the url, and was a typical, what i call a typical military maneuver. when they did it, they did not vet it very well.

they probably had two low level guys in there, scanning the things, and they posted. they had internal email, stuck with people's names, phone numbers. it was a violation of the privacy act. number one. number two, there were some really damaging documents in there, dimming for them, and i was in virginia when tom called me and told me they had posted these library documents, and i said while. no kidding? -- i said wow. i was with a friend, helping to clear some land, and when i got home, i started looking at this, and i thought, my god, this is the holy grail. >> where were you born? >> pennsylvania. >> what down? >> chambersburg, but then i grew

up outside of hershey, pa.. >> where do you live now? >> north carolina. >> do you live near jacksonville? >> i am miles up from camp lejeune. >> did you go out to where he works? >> i did, yes. >> how much of the interviews did you do? >> i was involved with all of the filming with him. >> it where is tom, and what did you find in him? >> he is very interesting. he lives in a small idaho down. it was in the midst of winter, very, very cold, very wintry. remote. i found him very interesting because he was an officer, it and he was equally disillusioned. he had lost a son, and his wife had passed away from a liver disease that he believed was related to the contamination, so

he was all wrong side jerry, and he did some of the digging and fact-finding, and i was mindful of the fact that he hates computers and likes to hand write everything, but he was digging out all of this information. on the website, they were downloading these massive pdf"s using a dialect. it took them weeks to get it from the portal. they would get the initial documents, and it would lead them to another document, and tom herr and rode over 1200 documents, because he does not like to type. >> what is a foya document? >> freedom of information act. and tom wrote over 1000. handwritten.

>> what kind of success did he have? >> he had a really good success, because tom was also calling the officials in the marine corps, and because he was a retired officer, he developed a relationship with one of the former chiefs of staff down there at the base, and this is really funny, because this man sent tom add the -- tom a dvd, a cd, of all of these documents, and we were out there at his house, and tom said, "oh, yes, he sent me a bunch of stuff, hard copy stuff, and he sent me these damn things," and they were in a pigeonhole in his desk, and i said, "oh, my god." i said, "have you looked at the is?" >> and he said, no, i put them

in this pitch and roll, and they had been there ever since." >> what were they? >> they were documents we had never seen. >> about what? >> regulations that they had maybe had created for drinking water standards on the naval installation. >> and when did they create the regulations? before your daughter died? >> oh, absolutely. this was back in 1965, and the navy had very strict regulations about drinking water did all of the way back to 1963. >> by the way, if you live near camp lejeune today, do you have anything to worry about? >> no. camp lejeune is located between the off base communities and the ocean, so contamination it naturally moves towards the end nearest large body of water, which would be the ocean. >> do you have anything to worry

about if you live in that area, like you did back then in the 1980's. or did they clean the contamination up? >> the contamination still exists under the ground, and they are supposed to be really eating it, but, unfortunately, the technology does not exist at this time to clean up an underground source of contamination or pollution problem. >> and this is tce? >> and fuel. benzene, others. >> to ask you right now not to defend but to describe all of that, i want to go back to the video from the documentary, which is how long? >> 76 minutes. >> and was that a conscious decision on your part to do only that long? >> it was. we wanted to try to keep the film at a manageable length.

there is a lot of information, but we wanted to get a balance between the personal story and all of the technical information, and we felt that 76 minutes would be a good length. >> did you shoot it on film or tape? >> tape. >> how long? >> over 400 minutes. >> here is a little bit more from your documentary. [video clip] >> i am appearing here today as one spokesperson for the hundreds of thousands of marines, sailors, their families, and loyal civilian employees who were unknowingly exposed to bubbles of toxins through their drinking water at camp lejeune, north carolina. >> doctor, if you had been on these bases and known about the contamination, which you have felt ok drinking that water? >> i think i personally would have been using different water.

>> i am told that officials waited years before they identified the contaminated wells and then closed them down in 1985. who was in charge then at camp lejeune? >> all of the officials at camp lejeune would have been in charge, just like they are today. >> your people were exposed to it, and you did not do anything? >> i would not say that the marine corps, camp lejeune did not do anything about it at that time. for as soon as they found out about it, they shot them down. >> that they notified the residence that they have been -- may have been exposed? did you not have a responsibility to notify the people that they may yet been exposed? >> yes, sir. >> that would have been a very laborious task. we could try.

but to get 100% of the people, that would be very difficult. >> who was at camp lejeune from 1965 and 2007. >> i do not believe you cannot do that. that is inconceivable. >> what was your reaction, and the woman that shook her head once, and also, i believe, another woman who is now deceased, explaining they were. >> the woman who shook her head initially introduced us to this story. the woman who it shook her head is another woman we followed in the film. when we met her, she was healthy, but shortly thereafter, she was diagnosed with cancer that, honestly, had metastasized so much of robotic, i do not think they could say what organ and started in, and

in addition to following jerry and tom and the others, we also followed her and she fought to stay alive to get this issue out. she did not make it in the time we were making the film, and neither tyco director or i had ever experienced that -- neither mike co-director or i had ever experienced that, but we believe strongly that her story should be in the film. even the sometimes she was not feeling so great when we were trying to film her because of chemotherapy treatment, she went through. >> what was the purpose of that hearing? >> the purpose of that hearing was specifically about camp lejeune and contaminated water. the hearing was entitled "poison patriots." >> your daughter janey died in 1985. was that the first time you testified, in 2007? >> no, sir.

i testified the first time in april, in 2004. the washington post had done an article in january 2004 about camp lejeune and the contaminated water, and that was titled "tainted water in the land of semper fi." congressman john dingell from -- a ranking member that time, his staff saw that article in the newspaper, and they had a hearing coming up, where the dod was trying to get more immunity from environmental organizations, and the congressman was rather angry about that, and it looked like his counterparts, the chairman, was joe barton at that time, it looked like they were going to give d.o. d.d.s. immunities, mr. dingell forced into a hearing,

and they asked me to come testify about camp lejeune and what happened at camp lejeune, and that was the first time that i testified, 2004. mr. cpac, who is no longer in congress, was on that committee and heard my testimony, and he said that if they ever won control of congress back and he became a chairman of a subcommittee in the energy commerce committee, he vowed that he would hold a hearing about tampa vision, and that is what happened. >> what did you offer the marine corps as an opportunity? i want to ask more about the general and his civilian colleague there, but what did you offer the marine corps when you made this documentary? >> we requested an interview multiple times, and they declined. we also asked to film on base,

to film footage on the base, and they spent a day with us. they had people with us, and we were able to get footage of the base to bring back alive, but it was important to us that their perspective be represented in some way, and so we are fortunate that they were brought before congress and in front of other news outlets, so we were able to pull the statements they made in the public forums and incorporate them into the film since we were not able to get a one-on-one. >> you told the commandant of the marine corps, you just made that statement. where was that, and were you still in the service? >> no. and when i say i told comic-con of the marine corps, i had to tell him third person or third party, through that third party, to relay that message to him.

they never provided me an opportunity to sit down and talk with the leadership. >> one of the things i kept thinking about when i was watching it, why would the people who lived at camp lejeune who were subject to the same kind of water that your family was exposed to, why would they want to automatically say that there is no toxins in this water? i mean, they are subject to -- it is like an airplane pilot you want to make sure that their plane is state before taking off. >> most of the people involved in this debate were not back then. some were. and the ones that were there back at the time of the contamination were not very high rank, so they are protecting the institution, and -- >> what does that mean

protecting in institution if you are not protecting your people? >> well, one thing that happened recently that got nationwide coverage was what happened at penn state univ. but the child sex abuse. those officials and leaders at penn state chose to protect the institution, the university, the football program over the protection of the kids that this man was abusing. the same thing is going on with the marine corps. they are protecting the institution over the health and safety of the people and serve them. >> we are going to show a clip of a man named mike partain and his wife. who are they, and why did you include them? >> mike partain is a man who lives in tallahassee, fla., and

found out about the camp lejeune after he saw jerry testifying. he saw cnn coverage of that. mike was born at camp lejeune, and when he was a child, he came down with male breast cancer. he did not have the genetic marker. it is a very rare situation. usually, there is a precursor for it. he was struggling with this illness when he heard about the water contamination through gerry's testimony and immediately called jerry and wanted more information, and as soon as he was healthy enough, he became very involved in the fight. we are really able to see somebody get immersed into this situation. when he met jerry he was already full into it. it was good to see might begin this process, which we were not

able to see whether jerry. >> let's watch more. video clip >> one man was diagnosed with breast cancer. there is a part of me that just says to be quiet. tell the people need to tell about it, and let's not make a big scene. >> one of the things that i have understood. our biggest weakness is the fact that we are not concentrated at camp lejeune. where you can drive down the street and you can see little susie's house where she died, and you go down and see another. you cannot do that at camp lejeune. they are only there for a couple of years, and they are gone, but as word of this gets out, that

weakness becomes our strength, because we are in every town across america. we are in every town, every city, and every state, and everyone of us has a congressman and a senator. >> did mike partain ever served?" he was in the navy for a short period of time, and he got discharged because he had a medical problem. he had severe rashes that they just could not clear up. >> but he was born at camp lejeune. why? >> it is father was a naval academy graduate, and his dad was a marine corps officer. >> another figure, and we do not have a clip, is that 70 men have breast cancer, related to what?

camp lejeune? >> yes. 70 different men. it is now 78 that mike has found. the only thing that all 78 of them have in common was camp lejeune. >> what was the marine corps reaction to that? >> denial. everything. anybody and anybody who asked the marine corps and the questions about this, they are denying it. denial, denial, denial. >> have never accepted any blame for any of this? >> as far as i know, no, they have not. in the time we have been filming, they have changed their message slightly, i would say. would you not say? maybe. but, certainly -- and one thing i want to mention about mike, what i've found amazing, there is a man diagnosed with this

rare breast cancer, and he immediately started thinking, there must be more out there, so we started contacting them. this 78 figure, a lot of these would not have even known about it had mike not begun the process of trying to find other people. media.d to do a lot o he got involved in a calendar shoot we feature where they did a photo shoot at the time. there were fewer men that they knew, about 65. it helped to raise more awareness. it was very religious. quests a lot of men have their pictures taken without their t- shirts on city could see the breast cancer operations. the only thing the 78 have a comment is that they -- having

common is that they lived or were born there. >> the disease registry has taken this issue up. they have gone to the nva and the va found 185 marines on their registry with male breast cancer. manual togoing to remai see how many were there when they start on the marine corps. 50% of them were at the camp. out of the 70, only 78 are on the va roles. >> from the documentary, she was 9 when he died? >> the day she died, she said "i

really hurts. ." i said i know, but he would take more fame. -- but he wanted more seeing. janie said, "stop. i want some of that for my daddy." she said, "we cannot give this to your daddy. this is a very strong pain medicine." and said, "it her know my daddy is hurting, too." >> who were the other women

beebread looking at in the clips? -- other women weaver looking at in the cliffs? >> my daughters. >> where is mom? >> she lives in jackson. >> are you divorced? >> yes. >> how much has she been involved? >> not at all. her mother was japanese. it is a language barrier. in reality, anybody that was a civilian that would have taken on what tom and i took on, and the only reason i attribute our success is because we were career marines. we knew the system. we knew when in how and where to find information. and to to go to. >> how did you set up your own

agreement about what would be included? what were the roleules? >> there were not. we did not really set that up. i do not know that jerry what we were getting into. i do not know that he anticipated for years. sometimes you can about for days at a time at his house and not just of invents. -- film events. you had done some media stuff, but some will come in for a day into an interview for a couple of hours. over time, a trust is build up. people allow themselves to become more vulnerable and share. i would assume that moment like that happen because jerry felt comfortable enough that we would handle that material

sensitively and with the respect it deserved or he would not have himself.the part to of >> they are careful not to allow any of us to see any of the footage. i understand why now. i did not understand it before. i kept nagging at them. they explained after the fact that people who see the film starts becoming actors. he can see that on some of these programs on television like "gold rush." they see themselves on film and in subsequent shows they change. that is why they would not let me see it.

>> when you are around the family and others, how many people were with you? >> it was myself, my co- director who is also the cinematographer, and a sound person. on bigger events if they're needed to be more logistical control, we may have an additional assistance. it was really just the three of us. sometimes it would just be tony and i and i would poorly do sound. we wanted to keep it a sensitive situation. >> at the end of the film, you say that the married duke biddle and the sundance institute, were they funders? >> they were. they gave us different grants. we have other funders in addition.

they were the foundation as that provided grants for the production. >> it is a small family foundation. they're interested because it is n.c.. the park foundation is a fairly large foundation that has an interest in the north carolina. some of it is just to support documentary films. >> level this is a political story. -- on one level, and this is a political story. some people can say you are overdoing it in there is no proof. that is one side. did anyone support this because they like the politics of its? >> i do not think so. i think the hook for many of our supporters was the idea that

this was an unusual messenger for an important buyer mental -- important environmental issue. they're trying to find a way to preach the of the choir and got their base of people who are already on board. one think that is appealing is that you do not expect this message coming from a career military person. we have been able to read to this audience of military folks who would not be attuned to this environmental message. >> how far had you gone personally would try to get somebody with a break on their shoulder to pay attention -- rank on their shoulder to pay attention? >> many years.

quite how high have you gotten? >> i had united states senators asked personally and the secretary of the navy sitting right beside him. when are you going to actually meet? >> what do they say? >> they will not respond. >> what are they afraid of? >> the truth. >> the truth lead to what that they're not personal liability -- the trustees to what that they're not personally liable. >> we say we never leave our own. >> one thing that they have done over the years is that they have told so many half truths and

total lies that now if they were to sit down with me face to face, i could show them with their own documents and counter what they have been saying. they did not want to do that. i have been a very cautious throughout this entire game and to speak -- thing to speak truth. i told everybody else that gets involved in this situation "do not ever speculate." if you're talking to media or congress, do not speculate. if you do not have a document out of their own files to back up what you are saying, keep your mouth shut. going back to mike, when he got

involved in 2007, tom was starting to fall out. mike was a godsend. he has a degree in history. he also has investigative skills. he is an insurance adjuster. he could not pay to raise his family on a high school history teacher's pay. he went and got a job. >> here is more from the documentary. we talk about the fire fighters. let's watch. >> would anyone of you be interested in speaking to the associated press? >> yes. >> of this thing about the field, this is going to explode. lejeune --

>> the form of cancer that might have been come from the water they use everyday. >> investigators now believe camp lejeune maybe the worst example of water contamination this country has ever seen. >> they were told to get rid of it. >> we were dumping toxic chemicals into the ground. >> we have to get to the bottom of this. that means congress will have to press for answers. >> we have lighting to do. >> thank you. >> dan rather a former marine? >> i believe he is. >> if you look to what words are being used, and the journalists were saying "scientists say" but the people who have the most at stake, said the military leaders

and officers don't even talk about this. >> i do not understand entirely why they will not speak of it. i hopthink they hoped it would go away from the beginning. the hope is that jerry will give up or the film will not get a lot of attention or that the issue is so -- it has been amazing that each effort they make gets more and more attention. he keeps the issue alive. >> how much of this might be that they are worried it will cost millions of dollars to get out of it? >> it is not just campus lejeune. there are hundreds of military sites from all branches. >> 130? >> no. 130 are the worst of the worst. hundreds more have various

levels of contamination. when you talk about the overall problem. , that gives you a hint as to why they hope this goes away. >> what about the reverse of that? they are looking at using "all he wants is money." >> any time that i have ever spoken about this issue, either testified for on interviews, i never raised the issue of money. i want the truth. money is second or third. no amount of money will bring janey back. >> what is the worst situation you heard of this besides losing a daughter. is there a situation where a whole family has gotten the cancer? >> there was a person featured in the film, mary freshwater,

who describes the loss of her two infant sons at one of the meetings. she holds up the little blue jumper and describes the death of her kids. just two weeks ago she called me one evening in the late afternoon crying. she has now been diagnosed with leukemia. >> how many in her family total? >> that will be three. >> we have the political side of this. brad miller, let's run the part where you are introducing janey ensminger act. where does the name "ensminger" come from? >> germany.

the most you'll find anywhere in the united states are pennsylvania. >> what do people do with that name? do they give you a nickname to make it easy on them? >> no, because it is not really that hard. people make it harder than it is. if you spell it the way you sound it out, it is very easy. >> here is the testimony. >> i am the father of the nine year old little girl. i can only surmise that had this conduct been demonstrated by a private industry and not the department of the fed's entity, and they would have most certainly found themselves in a federal court room long ago. it is my hope that someday soon all of us will finally be allowed to achieve so much

justice. may god bless janey and you for bestowing this honor upon us. ♪ >> i had in my hand comment hr742, may 5, 2011. that was the act that was introduced. from the u.s. senate, i have the other. that was february of 2011. what has happened to this legislation? on the house side, because it involves the veterans administration, that bill was turned over to the house veterans' affairs committee. the current chairman of the

committee is jeff miller from florida. he has been sitting on it. he would not even allow the committee to consider it. several weeks ago on a friday afternoon @ 3:45 p.m. on friday between 8 whole week's recess for presidents day, he put out a press release and wrote a letter the general asking him to consider awarding some of these benefits to veterans and his family's. he cited a $3 billion overage in these fy 2012 budget. i immediately got on the phone and called an ally of mine on the senate side you deals with the veterans committee and i said "what is this about a $3

billion of bridge and you have been looking for a pay-for." he said "that $3 billion over has been allocated to care facilities.eva he said it is gone. why is he writing this letter to sinhim? he is trying to put the blame off because the film was coming out and would be eric on national television. he was trying to take the monkey off his back is his thought and a thing. >> how close that you paid attention? >> quite a bit. at every screening, the first

question is practically what can we do? it is primarily about the legislation. we have a built in a take action portion of our website so that people have a little bit of help in finding a way to get the support for the legislation. we hand out fliers to point people in the right direction to contact their representatives and senators to support the legislation. there is really a strong sense of a desire to do something. we feel a response ability to be able to help channel that energy to support their efforts. we feel it is a great opportunity. in the house, how many of

those are republicans? >> about a handful out of all the co-sponsors. i think there is about five or six. >> this is not a partisan thing? >> it should not be so. >> explain that. >> senator byrd introduced this on the senate side appeared to was a republican. this in reality should be a non- partisan issue. i think the most abused phrase on capitol hill is "thank you for your service." do you know how angry that makes me? thank you for your service, but do not ask me for anything. quick thinking me for my service and do something.

anking me for my service and do something. i do not know many people about what to stand up in front of the bright light in give a speech is what you have a choir humming "america the beautiful" behind them but when they leave from behind the cameras and bright light comedy to the complete opposite. >> how much exposure that you had on this film? what happened at the oscars? >> the film premiered at the tribeca film festival. it was almost a year ago. after that, we started screening the film all over the country. we did do a special screening on capitol hill last june, right before the senate vote on 277.

it has received a tremendous amount of coverage. we made it to the oscar short list, at the top 15 films vying for an oscar. we did not make the final five. that was a big push. a short version aired oftebnn msnbc. a new head of attention happens. it has been great. >> give us a ballpark figure out how much of this cost you? >> there is so much that was deferred in kind. it is much less than a feature film. >> would it be more are less than a million? >> less than a million. >> did you get paid to do this?

>> absolutely not. it would not be a documentary the people that were in it got paid. i do not expect any money for its. i look at it this way. what they are doing with this film and what this bill would mean for this issue in forging an advancing this issue, it is priceless. just like your program here. our founding fathers really knew what they were talking about when they put freedom on the press. >> when he retired from the marine corps? >> 1994. >> what have you been doing since then? >> i did in varmint to work for a while. i farmed. -- environmental work for a while. i farmed. i got so involved in this. this is a full-time job with no pay.

>> what is your sense of the political system after you have been through this? >> what a mess. >> why do you say that? >> it is so polarized. our politics are so polarized there has been a sense of divide and conquer tactic that is being deployed in politics that they take items that are divisive and instead of politicians bringing our citizens together to find solutions for our problems, they are finding wedge issues to divide us. that has spread from capitol hill out into the public. you have got to be fearful about who you back in support in a campaign anymore. people will retaliate against

you. >> what is your reaction to the political system? >> it has been i opening for me. the thing that was the most i opening, i do not consider myself a naive person. i believe that our regulatory agencies were doing their job and protecting us. the things that were harmful would not really be in our environment and water. i realize that system is very flawed and we are not protected. that is a difficult for me to accept. this is a big revelation. >> let's go back to the beginning. what is your claim? your daughter died at age 9. she was sick for how long? >> nearly 2.5 years. it was acute lymphocytic that looking me.

quite your claim is that all the men that got the breast cancer is what? >> atsdr did a survey of the in neutral population and found that 12,600 of the estimated 1600605 births but to place -- 16,605 burst out of place, at the top of the kenya rates in that population is two to three times higher than the national average. >> they belong to what organization? >> it is part of the center for disease control. >> do they pass any this on to the marine corps? >> they are very involved in the process. they are aware of the health studies. they're dependent on a lot of

the information. >> that is a problem with our system. the department of defense entities controlled the documents for their pollution sites. they are currently right now dictating what atsdr can and cannot use in their study reports. >> rachel libert, where can somebody see this documentary? >> is available on netflix streaming, i tunes and amazon. card dvd's will be available later this year. it is streaming in all of those venues. how long you want to keep doing this? >> until the marine corps lives of to our mighty which is latin for "always faithful" or when

someone blows taps over me. >> jerry ensminger, former master of sergeant in the marine corps. rachel libert, co-director. thank you. the documentary is called "semper fi: always faithful." >> for a dvd copy of this program 8 call77-662-7726. for free transcripts are to give us your comments, visit us at www.q-and-a.org. "q & a" programs are also available as c-span podcasts. "washington journa[captioning py national captioning institute]