captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> woodruff: the leaders of ukraine's protests offered up their choice for the country's new prime minister, while just across the border, russia flexed it's military muscle. good evening, i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill, also ahead: bringing safer, cleaner cooking stoves to some of the billions around the world, who depend on them for food. and replacing the current threats in their homes. >> these stoves and the smoke they produce are blamed for two million deaths each year, from lung cancer and burns. their fires are a major source of greenhouse gases. their fuel a major cause of deforestation.

>> woodruff: plus, the future of the u.s. labor movement. after a string of union setbacks in the auto industry and the public sector. those are just some of the stories we're covering on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> i've been around long enough to recognize the people who are out there owning it. the ones getting involved, staying engaged. they are not afraid to question the path they're on. because the one question they never want to ask is, "how did i end up here?" i started schwab with those people. people who want to take ownership of their investments, like they do in every other aspect of their lives.

>> supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> ifill: tensions inside and outside ukraine ratcheted higher today, as lawmakers prepared to approve a new government. in crimea, pro-russian demonstrators clashed with supporters of the protest movement. meanwhile, russian president vladimir putin ordered surprise military exercises near the border with ukraine. we'll get more on all of this, right after the news summary. the u.s. military's top

commander is warning the impasse on a security deal with afghanistan could embolden the taliban. army general martin dempsey -- chairman of the joint chiefs -- spoke a day after president obama ordered plans for a total u.s. withdrawal by year's end. mr. obama also spoke with karzai by phone, for the first time since last june. today, karzai's spokesman played down any tension between the two. >> 2014 is the year of withdrawal of most of us forces anyway. and there was no such discussion of a complete withdrawal in the conversation as suggested in the media. rather the point was to provide for an orderly withdrawal as already planned and already( scheduled >> ifill: the u.s. wants to leave about 10,000 troops in afghanistan after 2014 to help train afghan forces. so far, karzai has refused to sign >> ifill: state media in syria reported today the army ambushed and killed at least 175 rebels

in a major attack. the official account said it happened south of damascus, in the ghouta area that's held by the opposition. syrian television aired this footage from the aftermath. it said the slain fighters belonged to an al qaeda-linked group, and that some came from abroad. if confirmed, it would be one of the deadliest attacks by government forces in the area. another ban on same-sex marriage has fallen, this time, in texas. a federal judge today declared the state's prohibition unconstitutional. but he postponed enforcing the decision, pending the outcome of appeals. this follows similar decisions in utah, oklahoma and virginia. a top house republican opened a bid today to overhaul the nation's tax system but it's unlikely to advance this year. republican dave camp chairs the house ways and means committee. he called for lowering the top income tax rate from 39.6% to 25%. he'd also impose a ten percent surtax on earned incomes over $450,000 dollars.

house speaker john boehner would not say if the party supports the bill, and he refused to discuss the details. >> blah, blah, blah, blah. listen, there's a conversation that needs to begin. this is the beginning of the conversation. the idea of tax reform is to get our economy going again, provide better, more economic growth, more jobs, and higher wages. the way you do that is bring down rates. and to bring down rates you clean out a lot of the garbage that's in there and the special interest issues that are in there. >> ifill: the last major overhaul of the tax code was in 1986. that data breach at target stores before the holiday shopping season took a hefty toll on the company's bottom line. profit dropped 46% in the fourth quarter, and revenue slipped more than 5%. the data breach allowed hackers to steal personal information on millions of target customers. the company says it's working to

win back the confidence of customers. on wall street today, the dow jones industrial average gained more than 18 points to close at 16,198. the nasdaq rose four points to close at 4292. and the s and p 500 was up just a fraction, at 1,845. still to come on the newshour: tensions in ukraine shift to a key region bordering russia; one study's promising results on child obesity; bringing safer, cleaner cooking stoves to the world's poor; how one bank reportedly helped hide billions from the i.r.s.; plus, the future of the u.s. labor movement.ç >> woodruff: more now, on ukraine. proposed new leaders were introduced to protesters in kiev today. but that was overshadowed by mounting concerns over russian military moves. in a late afternoon statement, the white house said:

all of this, as tempers flared between pro and anti-russian factions in crimea. lindsey hilsum of independent television news is there. >> reporter: the police struggled to hold them back. the crowd was surging forward, trying to force their way into the crimean parliament. on the one side, russians, many of whom would like crimea to secede from ukraine. on the other, crimean tatars with their pale turquoise flag,ç who support the new order in kiev, and are largely hostile to russia, which they see as their historical oppressor. the protests may be over in kiev, but the repercussions are being felt across ukraine. here, the tatars are delighted about the new authorities. but the russians are spoiling

for a fight. and some tatars were not convinced peaceful protest is the way to combat the crimean russians allying moscow. >> when it comes down to putin, you have to have fists. he doesn't understand good words and diplomacy. you have to show some physics too, so if they don't listen to us, we don't exclude some physical actions here, like in kiev, too. >> reporter: so you would turn to violence? >> no, no, no, no. we are for peace. but we want them to hear us. >> reporter: some on the russian side weren't keen to talk to a british journalist, a representative of europe, which many see as fascist. >> ( translated ): we don't say the british are fascists, but i live in crimea, and we want to join russia. >> reporter: the tatars were determined to stop a parliamentary debate on secession. some seized a russian flag. scuffles broke out.

people started lobbing shoes, water bottles, and other objects. it began to get ugly. the tatars are muslim. the russians paraded emblems of their orthodox christian faith. several people were injured. while others were crushed in the pushing and shoving. they were treated on the spot. across the border, the russians announced emergency military exercises. they made no mention of ukraine. no need to. the drills were in the nearest region. and the message to the new government in kiev was clear: don't mess with russia in kiev, they gathered in the central square, scene of three months of protest to talk about the new government, a new future. but here in crimea, the trouble has only just begun. >> woodruff: to help us

understand all of today's developments, we turn to: fiona hill, director of the center on the united states and europe at the brookings institution. her latest book is "mr. putin: operative in the kremlin." and nadia diuk, she's spent decades studying and visiting ukraine, and is a vice president at the national endowment for democracy. we welcome you both to the program, nadia diuk, giving these divisions we are seeing in this report and hearing about elsewhere, can this country hold together ukraine? >> i think what we saw in the film was basically about country$qah. i think the government being put together in kiev right now really is trying to address the issue of unity. there are people who have been brought into this line-up that would be voted on tomorrow that are from the east of ukraine. they are new faces. there was an interesting action today in the western city of leviv which is normally known as being pro western and very ukrainian.

they introduced a day of speaking russian. so that the-- and the mayor was leading this to show that whatever language ukrainians speak that they feel themselves to be one country and belong to one you knit. >> pushing for unity. but quickly, you brought up this new government who was introduced today to the protestors in kiev. what does that say to you aboutç the direction that this groups that's taken over wants to take the country. >> i took a look through the names. there are a lot of people there that will be familiar to people who will be watching for the last three months. i think thats with a major concern for people there that somehow the politicians might just take over and sweep away all of the civic activists, all of the people who really have been in some cases put their life on the line for a better future for ukraine, to get out the corrupt government. there were a lot of people from the-- here and it looks

like a very serious attempt to combine both professional people. i see that the minister of finances and the economy are actually professional, good solid people who have been if government before and are very familiar. >> so people with experience. >> with experience and new faces too. and also slightly different generations which is also good to see. >> fiona hill, let's talk about the russians. they've mobilized. they're doing what moscow is calling wargames what does this is a? >> this is sending a signal obviously that the russians deem it to be necessary that they're prepared to intervene in some fashion. we have to say that we've seen these kinds of exercises many times when there were tensions in different regs ons. not always in the west. it's something that we've seen again time and time when there is some point that the russians are concerned about it is not necessary leigh mean that they're going to intervene.

and as nadia said, the pictures that we're seeing that are most troubling coming out of ukraine are in crimea, the peninsula on the black sea, not where the army is and mobile identifiesing forces and exercise are going on. >> you say it doesn't necessarily mean that they're going to intervene. what would determine whether they do that or not? >> i think we have to be very careful when we're looking at this situation. we're only at the really the very beginning of a sequence of events now that is going to move us forward in ukraine. the russians are standing back. they're looking at what is happening. and i think it would really be, if it's deemed that there is going to be some serious threat to their interest directly, crimea is one of the places where that could happen because that is the black sea fleet, the russian fleet that has a long-term lease on parts of the peninsula. so if there seems to be some kind of physical threat to the black sea fleet one could enadviceage that there might be some kind of action. but not necessarily in the the way they're thinking

about it right now. >> woodruff: the leadership, this new leadership that's in formation, nadia diuk, in kiev and you talk about other parts of the country. they have to be very aware of what the russians are up to. what would their reaction be if russia tarted to makeç news toward intervening in some way? >> that would then be an international situation. and i think it would go far beyond the-- beyond the ukraine. i think the white house actually put out a statement today where they did reference an agreement where osce members really should be informing each other of any -- >> being european security. >> yeah. >> organizations, although the russians have before intervened in countries or threatened to intervene where they see the russian speaking people need pog protection. they did, they threatened this a lot in the baltic states in the 1990s. and that is one of the pretexts that they could use. >> fiona hill, what is the

impact? how is a statement like the one that cameç out today, secretary kerry saying it would be a terrible mistake or words to that affect for the russians to do something, the white house itself putting out a statement. how is that read by moscow do you think? >> the problem we have right now is we have all kinds of competing narratives about what is happening. the russians have also been accusing frankly the united stitz and the european union have directly intervening here as well. so sometimes the statements are not received in the way that we would hope they are in moskow. this might be seen as grandstanding in fact. rather than as a very clear statement that there is a red line here. we were as nadia suggested in the situation before in 2008, before the war with georgia in august of 2008, similar statements were made on all kinds of sides. and there was also a situation there where many citizens of russia, people without were living in the ses sessionist republic had

assumed russian citizenship were deemed to be at risk by the russian government. and again there was a situation where we saw momentum towards an intervention by russia. a lot of statements made. so we have been in this kind of very tense, difficult situation before. >> well, you both saying we're early in this process. and nadia diuk, you were talking about, of course, the new leadership being introduced. the next government being introduced to the protestors today. what is it that the people of ukraine are going to be doing in the days to come, their leadership that is going to send a signal to the world one way or another about what is going to happen? we know they've got crushing economic problems. they're looking to the west to help them out, or to moscow. >> well, firstly, the government was prevented to the people today but it does actually have to be voted on by the parliament tomorrow. there is a good chance that it will, that this list will go through. but the political leaders

have at every step of the way needed to check what they're doing with the people who through the last three months have been a little bit more radical and demanding than the politicians. the people generally want to have justice. they want to see that the corrupt politicians that were leading this country for the last three years were somehow brought to justice and made to account for the crimes that they've committed, the killings that have taken place. and also for a lot of the money that they have stolen which this weekend we saw these rather surç rel pictures of what this money was spent on. >> an fiona hill, just for now i hear you saying the russians will hold off before they make any dramatic decisions here. >> that will really depend on what happens on the ground in ukraine. again it depends on how russia sees its interests being served or threatened in some way by events. i think we also have to be very well aware that the situation in ukraine is such that this government may not stick.

there's an idea that they're trying to balance the whole competing interests. ukraine goes to a whole series of successive governments. and this will be a great concern to moscow as well, about the position of future governments will be, what stamps they take to the just on domestic issues but also on the foreign relationships. and if governments seem to veer very quickly towards europe or towards other sets of relationships, and neglecting the very important ties that the russians have with ukraine. >> that would have an effect. >> that would have an effect. >> if he owna hill, nadia hnk you. owna hill, nadia >> thank you. >> ifill: researchers are assessing, and in many cases, applauding, a new paper that reports a substantial drop in childhood obesity among the pre- school set, a 43% decline. it's raising interesting questions about whether a shift in public health policies helps explain what's happening.

>> reporter: first lady michelle obama has become the face of the administration's anti-obesity campaign, encouraging young people, especially, to eat better, move more and slim down. now, the centers for disease control is reporting some progress. among pre-schoolers aged two to five, obesity rates have dropped from 14%, to about 8% overall during the past decade. it's welcome news, since overweight pre-schoolers are five times as likely to become overweight adults. possible causes for the drop include: efforts to promote breast-feeding, cut consumption of sugary drinks and encourage exercise. the first lady's let's move campaign, for instance, has focused on changing nutrition and exercise habits among children. planting and harvesting a white house vegetable garden. and collaborating with celebrities like comedian will ferrell. >> also is diet cola? is that a vegetable?

>> ifill: and yesterday, the administration unveiled new rules that ban marketing of unhealthy food in schools. >> i think we can all agree that our classrooms should be healthy places where kids are not bombarded with ads for junk food. >> reporter: former new york city mayor michael bloomberg also took up the cause, moving to eliminate trans fats and limit the size of sodas and other sugary drinks. still, the c.d.c reports the apparent progress among pre- schoolers does not extend to other age groups. instead, a third of american children and teen-agers, and more than two-thirds of adults, remain obese or overweight. >> ifill: christina economos of tufts university watches all this closely. she's an associate professor at the schools of medicine and nutrition science. she also helps lead an initiative called childobesity180.org

okay, christina economos, give pe a sense of how significant the news of this decline is. >> good evening, these results are unequivocally amazingment and we really need to applaud. but we can't stop yet. this is aç small snapshot and it's a small group of children within the united states. and we need to reach all children between the ages of 2 and 19 and see progress. >> all good news is good new, i don't disagree with you there but we do wonder why it younger people are seeing improvement and others are not well, in that age group there's been tremendous effort to regulate within child care centre so that children are eating healthier foods, moving more and exposed to less screen time. we also know there have been changes to the wi cpga package that provides more fruits and vegetables, whole grains and supports breast-feeding. and these efforts really target 2 to 5-year-old children and have resulted in really significant decline. >> ifill: can i walk you through each of those possible2reasons one at a time. let's talk about the impact

of sugary drinks. how much does that contribute to what we're seeing, especially in children so young, you wouldn't think that would be a big issue. >> sure. a big percentage of sugar consumption in children comes from sugar sweetened beverage. and there have been several publicealth campaigns in place over the last five to ten years trying to reduce consumption for all children, particularly young children so they don't begin to drink sugary beverages and they continue consumption through the teen years. we know that hundreds of calories are consumed by teenagers every year, an surprisingly even around 100 calories in our very youngest children. >> what about physical activity n this children this young you would think that would be a given. >> you would think so they should be getting between one to two hours per day. but with all the different sedentary entie-- enticements now, children are often watching screens for pain, many hours per day, in an unsafe neighborhood, they might not be going outside to play. so a real effort is under way to get kids up and moving, expending calories

for one to two hours per day within child care centres, that's a really important cause. >> a lot of this is, we talked about recess making a comeback. in a lot of cases we're talking about nutritional awareness. is this something which starts with adults and a affecting the youngest children? >> definiteliment i think there is an increased awareness in this country that we have an obesity ep demming, that we need to change our eating habits. an very pornly we need to change the environment that we live in. so that means better policies, access and availability to healthier food for all americans, so in underserved areas as well as privileged areas. and many efforts are under way to make that happen. >> is there any way, you mentioned the difference between what's happening in underserved areas as well as privileged areas. and you also mention the change in the women, infants and children nutrition program. how much of that can you break out. >> i know this is a small incident but how much do you know in these kinds of programs is it having an

effect? >> well, we mow that children who are eligible for assistance like wic serve underprivileged chrn and those changes are very important for them. but if we pull apart the recent data we're talking about now and the decline in the obesity rates it starts to unravel when you look at the disparities. soç we know that white children have lower rates than black children and hispanic children. and the disparities are quite striking. and that tells us more effort has to be put into reaching underserved children whether income or race ethnicity impacting that, and putting more effort into government programs and community programs that really reach those children. >> ifill: how do you do that at a time of other priorities being made in government spending and in government in general, and a nutrition program. how do you take this piece of good news that we've discovered today and have it expand to other demographics and age groups? >> sure. well, this problem ofé-obesity t and it really requires the

systemmed approach to deal with it. so it means that we can't just wock within health care or schools or child care. we need to work systemically and make changes in all of those systems. because collectively that's what will show us the change. and we know that children move out of environments throughout the day that are serviced by government dollars an private dollars and so everyone working together make these changes, will really add up to declines in obesity throughout childhood. >> ifill: the other thing we heard about and we keep hearing about labeling and nutrition labeling and also this idea that marketing in schools, even if they are not zfbing sodas, just having a big soft drink sign could have an effect. how much of that is going to drive what happens next? >> i think will be a big part. a lot of us believe that we need to reduce exposure to marketing for young children. they're unable to differentiate something that is being advertised to them and something that is being brought to them as education. so we need to work really

hard to make sure that children aren't exposed to messages for unhealthy foods and schools should not be a place where they see those messages. we also need to reduce exposure through television and other areas where they go. >> what do you say to people who look at something like this and say the government cannot take away my hot dog for my child. this is just getting in the way of our right to nourish ourselves the way we choose. >> yeah, government steps in to make changes that we know are best for the population. and we've done this through multiple public health strategies, with smoking, for example, and in this case, we have a set of dietary guidelines. we know what children should be exposed to and should be consuming. and in situations where they're spending large amounts of time, they should be provided with those healthy foods. and as government plays a roling i think that's really important. but it's not just government. it's also the private sector and academics who are doing good research, putting out recommendations. and communities across the country so it really is a collective effort that we need to be focused on.

>> christina economos of tufts university, thank you very much. >> woodruff: next, in el salvador, one group is trying to solve a major problem by tackling it on a small scale. special corespondent fred de sam lazaro has the story. it's part of his ongoing series, agents for change. >> thank you julia roberts is a celebrity spokesperson to provide cleaner stoves to the estimated $3 billion worldwide who rely on open fire indoor cook stoves. these stoves and the smoke they produce are blamed for 2 million deaths etch year from lung cancer and burns. fires are a major souse of greenhouse gases, their fuel a major cause of

deforestation. there have been many efforts so far to provide improved stoves but with onlyç scattered small scale success. >> these are what, five or six of 65, 70 different stoves that are out there. >> heading the global alliance for clean cook stoves was set up in 2010 to bring some coherence to the varreas efforts. working under the u.n. foundation and with a $100 million u.s. government grant, the agency is trying to find out what works and what doesn't work to rate the various models for efficiency and to fund research into new ones. the things that we learned from the past efforts is that in the assumption if we provide a cleaner cook stove that is far better than a three stone fire, so of course every household member would want that but cooking patterns are different, cultural habits are different. and peopleç everywhere are the name. -- same. we would like to have some say, we would like to have some choice. >> one enterprise in central america believes it offers the right choice.

in rural el salvadore gustavo pino is the chief traveling salesman for a cook stove made in his factory. one that he promises housewives can vastly improve their lives because it burns fuel more efficiently, meaning it needs less firewood and emits less smoke. >> the stove uses very little firewood because the heat is concentrate approximated in the chamber. >> we normally raf -- >> its idea is to leave the stove in the community so that everyone can see itness how it performs, how it really saves wood. >> in is going to be a fibreglass mold. >> pena is a native of central el salvadore who lived previously in the u.s. and canada. he got started in the business when he met nancy hughs, the founder of stove team international. >> this is something -- >> hughes is a 70-year-old oregon native and began visiting this region about 14 years ago as a volunteer.

>> after i was widowed, i decided to reinvent my life so i went on a medical mission to guatemala. and i did what they asked me to do which was cook, in the kitchen. and a young woman came into the kitchen whose hand had been burned shut from falling in an open cooking fire. >> such experiences drove hughes to look for ways to provide cleaner, safer stoves. but noted engineer and friend larry winursky offered it design one and with pena ready to manufacture it, hughes went to her local rotary club and asked them for start-up funds. >> i was standing around with these rot arians and they said you can start a factory in el salvadore. and i was like i'm over 65, i'm to the doing that. and so one of the people on the team said listen, we've got a great stove, we've got a guy who wants to produce them. we can raise money so let's raise money and place an order for stoves with him and let him go and let him

own the factory and we don't have to do it. that was very appealing with similar rotary club funding the team has set up six factories across central america and mexico. each owned by a local entrepreneur. it's a very different approach than most aid groups. they've often imported mass produced stoves and given them out for free or at almost no cost to users. >> one reason stove team says it's been successful is that its stoves are locally produced. and they're design is informed by local food customs. the biggest problem, most women here probably could not afford to buy one. >> after a couple of weeks we come back, we get a list of people that really want the stove. and then we contact some ngos that can bringç them over to the community and they make an application to see if they apply to get a discount for the stove. >> discount, not giveaway. pena says it costs about $40 to mick one of these models. he sells them for 60.

but aid groups subsidize most sales. patricia works for the charitable arm of a fearby power utility. she agreed on this day to help with the purchase of 200 stoves, bringing the price down by about 50%. >> we prefer to charge them something for the stove. people won't appreciate them if they don't pay for them. >> she and many other development experts say if people are going to pay for something, they need to be convinced it's worth it. this may seem like common sense in a market based system but in the business of aid, historically few donors have asked their recipients opinion. one reason expertsç say many aid projects fail. >> it's a big lesson. i think it's a big lesson of, really not just assuming that the users of beneficiaries but users as consumers and active participants in the whole process >> reporter: that you should

talk to. >> absolutely. so and, and i think its a lesson broadly in development. it extends outside of the cook- stove space as well. in the past i think in development you've heard the term beneficiary being used a lot. and i think that speaks volumes. >> a 2012 harvard mit study followed 2600 households in india that were provided improved stoves. it found that most people quickly reverted to their old methods. they weren't able to start and use the improved stoves properly or maintain them. as a result there was little benefit to human health or air quality. >> stove team wants to make sure the 40,000 stoves it has sold so far remain in use and in work order. it's training teams to visit buyers regularly and survey the use of their stoves. >> the plan is to fund these home visits through the sale of carbon credits. since the stoves redoes emissions pena company gets

cede at this time can sell to manufacturers most in europe who use them in offsets for their own pollution. >> firewood consumption before and after a stove is purchased are measured to determine the size of the credit. >> we know through laboratory and field testing, they save 50% of the wood that is being used normally in an open fear and they reduce carbon emissions and particularate matter by 70%. >> while stove team tries to protect a business model that tries to be sustainable, the global alliance say the overall effort will need to be vastly scaled up and made attractive to commercial investors. its goal is to provide 100 million clean stoves by >> ifill: fred's reporting is a partnership with the under-told stories project at saint mary's university in minnesota. online, you can find examples of five different clean-burning stoves used around the world.

>> ifill: offshore bank accounts and tax evasion: it's a sore spot between the u.s. and switzerland. now a new senate investigation is adding more fuel to that fire. the senate probe finds that banking giant credit suisse helped thousands of wealthy americans hide billions of dollars from the i.r.s. overseas. the report found that in 2006 the swiss bank had about 22,000 accounts with u.s. customers totaling more than $12 billion. but so far, it has provided only 238 names, or about 1% of the total, to u.s. authorities. today, the bank's leadership testified before the senate permanent subcommittee on investigations. credit suisse general counsel romeo cerutti said swiss law prevents his firm fromç disclosing more information. but that drew a testy reaction from chairman carl levin of michigan.

>> article 47 of the swiss banking law, it's the banking secrecy provision, prohibits us from furnishing any client names to anyone within switzerland or outside of switzerland. and this is subject to imprisonment and fines. >> you come to this country and you're governed by this country's laws, by almost universally accepted law.ç and yet you hide behind the swiss law even though you're operating here. and that's just simply not going to cut it. >> woodruff: the report details what credit suisse allegedly did to help americans evade taxes and it also criticized the u.s. justice department for its role in prosecuting all this. gina chon of the financial times has been covering this story and was at today's hearing.

>> welcome to the newshour, gina chon, first what did this report say these banks had been doing. >> well, it was a pretty scathing report it went into great detail about what senator leff inl-- levin called cloak-and-dagger tactics this they employed to basically help their clients hide tax a void u.s. taxes and hide assets. so they listed using secret elevators that were remote controlled, having a special office at the zurich airport and even passing account statements hidden in "sports illustrated" magazine to hide these activities. >> woodruff: and so what was the reaction, we heard what senator levin was saying, what did others, what was the overall reaction of the committee today. >> they were pretty harsh and they spare nod criticisms all around for both credit suisse, for the swiss government and for the justice department, for all

failing to act more quickly and providing more transdns done transparns parenc' to get these names. >> credit suisse say what, we are just abiding by the law,. >> yeah, they just kept repeating that they're caught between a recognize and a hard place wrchl they are under both u.s. law and swiss law. and so if they abide by the u.s. law and provide these names, as you heard, they could face pros kuchlingts and there is an interesting exchange with senator coburn where he basically asked, well, where would you prefer to serve time, here or there. >> and so i mean is it clear though, i mean does it come out of the hearing whether they are in violation of american law? >> well, interestingly, even justice department official, the deputy attorney general also said that the swiss bank secrecy laws had prevented them from getting the names. and that the swiss government had essentially blocked credit suisse from providing that. so even they agreed that thats with a problem.

>> well, and we mentioned that is another strand of all this the senate report pointed a finger at the u.s. justice department and said you're to the doing enough to go after this. what is the explanation coming from the justice department? >> well, they are also saying even when they issue subpoenas that the swiss government also needs to block that, so that hasn't even been affect any getting records. so what they areç saying is they are trying to build a criminal case against credit suisse and try to use that then as incentive to cooperate. >> woodruff: is there any new information or explanation that came out today? i assume the senators raised with the credit suisse officials some of these stories that you were just telling about hiding a financial report inside a "sports illustrated" magazine or having a meeting on an elevator z they bring some of this up? >> yeah, a lot of that had come out in previous indictments because there were 7 former credit suisse bankers were indicted from 2011. but the problem is that those senators kept

repeating that no one has faced trial new york one has had a u.s. extradition request. and that has been a problem for prosecution. >> woodruff: so as of right nowç what is the liability of credit suisse and its officials, its leadership. >> sure, well, so, they stressed very heavily during the hearing that no management were involved or had knowledge of this. and they are negotiating with the justice department over negotiation force a settlement and the hearing could possibly put more pressure on justice to get higher fines. >> woodruff: and finally these 238 names out of thousands, what has happened to these people? are they being prosecuted in some way? >> well, they said that they are forcing them now to pay the u.s. taxes. but they haven't been prosecuted. what they are hoping to get is more names and some of the people who are responsibility at the bank for perpetrating this. >> it is a story we'll

continue to watch. gina chon with the financial times, thank you. >> thank you. >> ifill: now, a showdown for big labor raises questions about its future in the south and beyond. jeffrey brown has our look. >> brown: two weeks ago, employees at this volkswagen plant in chattanooga voted against joining the united auto workers. it was close, 712 to 626, but the outcome ended the union's two year long effort to organize the plant. officially, volkswagen was neutral, but it wants to create an employee-management council at the plant, and legally, it can't do that without union involvement. frank fischer is c.e.o of v.w.'s chattanooga operation. >> i want to thank all of our chattanooga production maintenance employees for their participation in this election

to decide the question of union representation. they have spoken and volkswagen will respect the decision of the majority. >> brown: the u.a.w. hoped a win in chattanooga would launch it toward organizing 20 foreign auto plants across the south and reverse a long decline in its membership. in 1979, the u.a.w.'s ranks peaked, at 1.5 million members. 35 years later, that number has plummeted to around 390,000. the u.a.w.'s efforts in chattanooga ran into strong opposition from republican senator bob corker, a former mayor. he insisted unionization wouldn't have provided any real benefits. >> the pay out there is already above what u.a.w. workers make that have worked the same amount of time. i don't see how they can improve the environment that they work in or the safety. we have the number one environmentally-sound building

in the world. and so this was about one thing and i think the employees realized that. >> reporter: the u.a.w. has filed a formal objection with the national labor relations board, charging volkswagen workers were unfairly influenced, and intimidated, by outsiders. but five v.w. chattanooga workers filed their own petition yesterday, asking the n.l.r.b. to block any re-vote. they accused the company and the union of colluding to force unionization. >> ifill: now, two people who have followed these events closely. linda chavez is chairwoman of the center for equal opportunity, a conservative think tank and author of "betrayal: how union bosses shake down their members and corrupt american politics"ç and kate bronfenbrenner is director of labor education research at the school of industrial and labor relations at cornell university. and editor of the book "global unions."

let me start with you, this was clearly a loss for the uaw and organized labor but how big was it and do you see anything positive for the unions to take from it? >> i think people are making more of this loss than they should. it was a close election.ç and it was not a surprising loss given that this was as we see in many campaigns a campaign where a union went in expecting to have neutrality and ended up with an opposition campaign, a fairly aggressive opposition campaign, not from the employer but from political figures and the business committee, business community that was, in effect, the same as an employer opposition campaign. the problem was the union didn't run the kind of campaign that is needed when

you have opposition. >> all right, let me get linda clave easy first to comment on what do you take from what happened in chattanooga? >> well, i think it was not surprising. i think miss bron february bren certificate right about that. what is not surprising about it is that we had seen a very precipitous decline of union membership across the country in the last 60 years. it's down to less than 7% of non-- of private sector workers are in unions. and the union movement would be almost dead if it were not for public employee unions. so it wasn't terribly surprising that they lost this election. and i think it has much to do with what has happened to the labor movement, what their goals are, their shift away from organizing and into politics. and i think this really hurt them in i place like tennessee. >> well, speaking of a place like tennessee, kate bronfenbrenner, you made a case in your writing that the south is actually this

goes against-- but that there really are opportunities for unions in the south. >> that's right. in fact, unions have had higher win rates in the south than they've had in the rest of the country. and that's because the south is fertile ground both because of the demographics in the south. the south is the area where the percent of workers of color both black workers and latino workers is growing faster than anywhere else in the u.s. and because the kind of occupationsç and industry that are in the south are the kind of jobs where workers are most likely to want to organize. low-wage jobs and manufacturing and service. and jobs where there are high percentage of women workers and lower wage women workers of color are the workers who are most likely to organize unions.

and we see in the country that we've seen janitors in houston, we've seen public sector workers throughout the south have been organizing. and we see have seen health care workers organize. and manufacturing workers organize in the south.ç yes, the workers in tennessee didn't win. but those were primarily white workers and primarily white male workers. and they could have won, actually, if the union had not been thinking that there wasn't going to be any opposition. the union actually runs a comprehensive campaign they would have won. >> so lynna chavez, this goes to the changing demographics of the country, the possible changing demographics that affect unions in the south. what do you see? >> well, first of all, union membership among women is lower than it is among men it is true that blacks are

more likely to join unions than whites are but his pan ecks are not very likely to join unions, so the democracy has part of the explanation. i think the real explanation is unions used to be able to provide something to workers. there was a time when if you wanted to have a safe working place, if you wanted to have decent benefits, joining a union made sense and you were willing to fork over the two hours worth of pay that the uaw requires in order to be part of the union. but now the unions really seen that most of their activity is political. many of the kinds of benefits that they used to provide are now guaranteed by law. health care which used to be a big big plus for union membership now with obama care, unions lose even that advantage. and in fact, the kind of cadillac insurance plans that unions were very suggest cessful at getting for their workers are going to receive an excise tax.

so you're going to see that that is not going to be much of a plus for union members either. >> but to say with you miss chavez, you're saying that this is the overarching issue generally for the larger picture for unions. it goes beyond individual project, such as in chattanooga? >> that's right. i mean it used to be that employers smartened up. they have to attract workers. there's competition for workers. so you've got employers now giving their employees the kind of thing that used to be won with very hard battle. by the union. and again, you have unions now focusing almost entirely on political activity. they spend a lot more of their time, energy and money organizing politically and the a againa that they support, generally is quite liberal, very left wing, even though 40% of union households vote republican in presidential elections, 90% of the money from unions goes to the democratic

party. so this is part of their problem. >> okay, so just in our last minute you can respond both to the political issues you brought up and also just the what do unions have to offer today to workers. >> well, they must suffer something because we have workers who went all over the country willing to risk their jobs and go out on strike, to strikeç for wal-mart and at mcdonald's and at car washes because they wanted a union. and these workers were not, they were striking because they wanted better working conditions, because they wanted less arbitrary decisions by supervisors. they felt like the union is the way that they can get those things. and we had hundreds of strikes this year by workers, all over. they were -- and they wanted

15 dollars an hour. and the union, we have hundreds of thousands of workers organize this year and, in fact, more workers organized this year in the private sector than in the public sectorç. union-- increased in the private sector. so workers seem to want unions. it's hart to do it. they have to jump through hoops of fire to do it because of employer opposition but they're still fighting for unions. >> okay, we do have to -- >> today just as much as ever. >> okay, we do have to leave it there, kate bronfenbrenner and linda chavez, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> ifill: again, the major developments of the day. tensions inside and outside ukraine ratcheted higher. pro- and anti-russian demonstrators clashed in crimea, while russia put thousands of troops on alert. late today, the white house

warned against any outside interference in ukraine. and a federal judge in texas struck down the state ban on gay marriage, the latest in a series of such rulings. >> ifill: online right now, since we're seven days away from madri gras, we're exploring the seven deadly sins. we start with the science of sloth. turns out, putting something off can be bad for your health. what explains the human tendency for chronic procrastination? all that and more is on our website newshour.pbs.org. >> woodruff: last night's report by kwame holman on the battle over the future of the a-10 warthog aircraft provoked hundreds of responses from our viewers. we thought we'd share a few with you. one visitor who weighed in against the pentagon's decision to retire the jet said:

another wrote: and another complained: >> ifill: but not everyone agreed the warthog should be saved. one viewer on our facebook page said: another wrote: if you'd like to see more comments, or write your own, visit our website or facebook page or tweet us back at

newshour. >> woodruff: an editor's note before we go, about the newshour's science correspondent, miles o'brien. he was on assignment for us in the philippines when he dropped a camera case on his left arm. the injury became life- threatening and, during emergency surgery, miles' left arm was amputated below the elbow.ç on our website, you can find a link to miles' own account of the accident and the extraordinary turn of events that followed. all of his newshour colleagues are amazed by miles' determination to soldier on, in spite of his life-changing accident. he is a very brave man and a cherished friend. >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. and i'm gwen ifill. we'll see you on-line and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us here at the pbs newshour, thank you and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

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