if you. see. wealthy british. markets why not. happening to the global economy in these kinds of reports.

it's team weather conditions playing that phrase granted the rescue mission to free the t.v. remaining said that's in the eyes of practice it's. also coming up with a program cashing in on conflict sort of over half of americans are against the country's war the fears plan cuts of the pentagon won't go ahead of big business gets its way we report. and pension of poverty the traditional image of

a happy retirement in the united kingdom is shocked by a report which says the elderly are suffering financially more than any other group . this is r t it's midnight here in moscow now my name is kevin irwin and our top story for you tonight trapped by ice for almost two weeks now refrigerator a vessel stuck in frozen waters of russia's far east is being towed by two ice breakers several other ships have been rescued from the same situation over the last few days that now leaves just one more with over three hundred crew aboard the last to be freed sarah firth has the latest. two ice breakers still working hard to free these remaining two ships that has been incredibly tough.

i think the president of the macro to say this at the remaining t.v.'s the refrigerator said and they bought a seat at that time now to get it through the thin ice area but it's been tough going they've had to battle with this incredibly thick ice and the plan is today and it was a full to the it was again and get the launch of the ship which is the supply vessel that is so that was going to be much trickier to get out of the ice again and really need to combine the efforts of basins the middle of a press conference today we had the federal fishing agency saying that there really is a lot of complications with this they're trying to come up with different maneuvers to the ice break his teammates effectively break through the size moose they heard that they were possibly thinking of dispatching a helicopter to try and help with the navigation of it in the tough conditions that we see and the full visibility that has to be full of the maybe we can hear more from that press conference now. the ships will soon close together towards the area

if they're not used for another thirty five miles then both lunch break as we return to the supply ship. now these tough weather conditions we see really affecting this whole operation five remember it's been twelve days now that the original three ships clued in for that rescue we then saw the two ice breakers make out in and out home across dispatched to help them and earlier last week another couple of ships getting stuck in the ice and then had to be helped so they've managed to free up three of them as we said the telling the full and they're planning to go back for the fifth officials are saying that hatefully the one that's being told at the name of the refrigerator vessel i should get to then arises. possibly to more ice at some point some more and then be able to gave out the largest supply ship that we've also heard that that's going to be made. some problems with refueling break is say it's not certain exactly what's going to happen with that yet of course the crippled the supply ship that eva three hundred

three men we should desperately get out to be treated i thought that they did it as he said the weather conditions at the navy make it very hard given i hear it as soon as one of the feet. sort of firth on top of that story the u.s. plans to spend seven hundred twenty five billion dollars on its military this year ahead of plans to trim the budget over the next five years but there's concern that those cuts will be jeopardized by the interests of big business in search of lucrative military contracts is lauren lyster investigate. when it comes to the afghan war well over half of americans oppose it and after a year of record casualties and having ploughed in over three hundred sixty six billion dollars why is the us committed to staying the course there are all kinds of motives for that war exuding energy motives and profit motives and strategic motives and if you're wondering why some in the us just might not want to see the

war and ever hear of three reasons thirty six billion twenty five billion twenty three point five billion those are roughly the dollar amounts the top three american defense companies were handed in government contracts in two thousand and eight a president once warned about this industry we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence whether sought all runs or by the military industrial complex it was fifty years ago that u.s. president eisenhower said those now famous words let's look at though were u.s. defense spending has gone since then it's skyrocketed from just around five hundred billion during the vietnam war to more than seven hundred billion dollars now during the post nine eleven wars and some argue that escalation is tied to exactly what eisenhower was warning about but there's a whole range of business that just you know lives off fighting wars and i think in some you know particularly arms companies because they have representation every

state and district in the country in many cases they have a congress on their side you know to build the weapons or if necessary to use them lawmakers cast the votes that ensure a military contractor such as lockheed martin gets two hundred sixty dollars from each household a year according to hart on three search making it the single largest recipient of taxpayer dollars meanwhile companies like lockheed dole out millions in political contributions and for lobbying each year and promise to deliver politicians not just weapons but jobs sometimes they will even say you know. if you vote with us we'll put a factory in your district that those who agree with part time say the defense dollars are sure to keep coming for contractors as long as the influence continues and as long as the empire continues to expand you're suggesting then a permanent u.s. presence in afghanistan something which you consider we have bases all over the world when you think strategically you may wonder if the us really wants to end the

war or ever leave afghanistan again or stand is next to the middle east and it's next to russia and it's next to china it's a wonderful place to have bases and weapons and nuclear weapons it's a place where they very much want to put a natural gas pipeline looking at recent history our combat mission is ending but our commitment to iraq's future is not what does it mean to say a war the united states would like to and the iraq war by keeping the military bases there keeping fifty thousand troops there keeping enough control of the economy so that if the iraqis do anything at all that the united states and its investors don't like we can immediately kill another hundred thousand iraqis and while in afghanistan the u.s. is still spending billions trying to win the hearts and minds of the people it looks to some like resources are going in a different direction than tribal law and for at least a mile and

a half there will be a wall and there is some kind of big american construction of i mean it's depots and housing happening on the other side of that wall and on the other side of that road you see the people who are displaced are actually living in tents without heaters and without blankets not through cold winter afghans left out in the cold while the u.s. government and corporations appear to capitalize on a war that looks here to stay lauren lyster r.t. new york. we're focusing on the u.k. next to a pension as a going bankrupt faster than any of the group in the country and insolvency service report indicates that over the past decade the number of elderly with growing debts and reduced income has risen six fold as artie's lorimer has been finding that leaves them struggling to afford even the basics retirement depicted as a golden age where older people get more time to enjoy their families and hobbies but a new survey shows a different side of old age in britain

a worrying picture of a country where more and more elderly people can't afford to retire pensioner lydia portsmouth won't say how much money she gets from the state but she's forced to dip into her limited savings to pay her monthly bills like many others she wasn't able to push away a lot of money for her retirement and what she does have is now earning so little interest in the bank that she regularly has to spend the capital that money. if you know that. to try and make out the money that come in that because nothing done back in again. would have to fell that. lydia is one of the lucky ones she owns her own home and has a small amount of savings but data from the office for national statistics shows

more than half of single pensioners in the u.k. live on the equivalent of less than forty five dollars a day with nearly a quarter of a million getting by on hoth that the consumer credit counseling service helps people to repay debt when they get into trouble they're seeing an increasing number of older people with huge credit card debts and no way to repay them and they say life's only going to get more difficult they're going to get worse and all costs. be. quickly. by. a problem it's a bleak picture for pensioners present and future rock bottom interest rates mean the elderly can no longer live off the interest from their nest eggs if they have any and interest rates may not go up for several years a new pension scheme which will oblige employers to pay into a fund for all their employees isn't due to come online till twenty twelve the

result seven out of ten people in the u.k. canton visit a traditional retirement in the future where people stop work and live off their pensions for thirty years and for every year the government raises the pension age currently sixty for women and sixty five for men it stands to save itself twenty billion dollars it's a freezing winter here in the u.k. so many pensioners will struggle to pay heating bills and it's unlikely to get any easier for older people the government plans to raise the age at which people could receive a state pension to come back to government debts and as a response to higher life expectancy but while that's all right for the rich critics say it's the poor who will suffer by being forced to work until they drop. lore and it's artsy doesn't it. the twenty two year old man charged with the attempted murder of a u.s. congresswoman is to appear in a u.s. court later monday jarrett lockin is accused of going on

a shooting rampage outside a supermarket in the state of arizona where democrat gabrielle giffords was shot in the head to remains a critical condition this morning six other people were killed including a nine year old girl and a district judge want to discuss the wider implications of what's happened here we're joined by professor joseph from california state university an expert in political history very good morning to you professor polygamy thanks for being with us well as the u.s. mourns the dead and hopes for the very speedy recovery of gabrielle giffords this morning the question on everyone's lips is of course why why would someone do this this talk about political extremism may be at play here this is all speculation of course but what do you think. well i think the tenor and tone especially down there and in arizona as the sheriff said he was able to say something i think it was remarkable that the rest of the american news media tends to ignore sweep under the rug is that the the tenor and the vitriol

and the hatred really that has been going on in this country i think for the last couple of years the far right has become unhinged we have the first african-american president in our history the white supremacists the racists there's been a up tick across the board in extremism from the right and with our economic problems as well we are in a period in america right now throw in the guns as well we're in a period right now where it is very volatile and very dangerous it's not surprising at all that there would be violent action directed against political figures that this in this climate socially in arizona i might add where they. always have this very bleak pay particular. so is this just a sporadic outbreak of violence every likely to expect more tragic incidents like this in the future than. well in two thousand and nine of course of the shooting of

abortion doctor in the wichita kansas by a radical right wing anti-abortion activists there was a shooting in april of zero nine three pittsburgh police officers by a white supremacist who had posted on a web site a white supremacist website a video link to a glenn beck show glenn beck of fox news was going on about the federal emergency management agency said in a concentration camps in america the rhetoric has been overblown about barack obama and his presidency and the administration and i'm afraid the climate right wing talk radio fox news. people like ann coulter sarah palin herself they have been extremely divisive in the a lot of time the rhetoric they use is violent rhetoric and it's not they're not forcing the hand of unbalanced people to come out of the woodwork and do these

kinds of acts of violence but certainly the loudness the noise machine of the far right in this country in the last two years has been extraordinary despite the efforts of more sane people try to call for a more civil discourse a more civil dialogue to try to tamp down the tone it's really not not happening i think unfortunately the american news media is not doing a good job of helping to tamp down the tone as well you know picking up on that indeed in a recent article of yours he you plain don't you the mainstream media for the way it put trey's political extremism in the us is a problem of equal proportion of them both the left and the right now you know those say that's quite different it's a very different picture. yes the noise machine the echo chamber the publishing houses the think tanks that the apparatus the money the

power of the right wing. i call it noise machine that it is just a constant drumbeat that not only voices opposition to president obama for instance but also just smears him in the most vile ways i mean they're calling him a kenyan maumelle an anti colonial asked. a man who hates white people i mean the rhetoric in this country has been so over the top since barack obama's election in particular. that there's no other way to explain and now violence on the left i would like to see the news media provide an example for that i mean there hasn't been any left wing violence in america since the weather underground and there was some radical environmental groups in the ninety's the attack property once in a while but they haven't done anything either the violence in the last ten years or so has been very strongly coming from the right like i said the holocaust museum in

washington d.c. was attacked. there's been all sorts of death threats obama has self himself when he was running for president he had more death threats than any other candidate american history they picked up three men in denver or in colorado arrested them for an assassination plot they had high powered rifles they had walkie talkies the racism here in the last two years it's just been extraordinary and to try to impose a photo balance on this as if it's coming the violent rhetoric is coming from the left and the right i would just ask my colleagues and friends among the republicans who among you on the left is the equivalent of someone like ann coulter or glenn beck or these or lib rush limbaugh or michael savage is very incendiary attack. on where the only time is against professor joseph from california state university really good to have you on the program may your thoughts thank you. sharing videos

and pictures online is all the rage these days but it's never been quite like this story russian scientists have developed a microscope system that lets their colleagues from around the world zoom in and view the tiniest bacteria over the internet in real time marty's tom brings us a close up view. but imagine a terrible virus sweeping across the planet scientists racing to try and understand it then stop it then imagine a new to enabling all those scientists via the web to see the minute structure of that virus within minutes it's a question that concerns the scientists and engineers in moscow we should know all about the why of all particles in both. all the viral particles it will give both of both. to develop in your way. we sure will defeat. the device is called a scanning probe microscope and they've existed for some time in many countries but

this team has zoomed in on a novel potential this professor from a university in faraway italy isn't just able to talk about the microscope online using special software he can actually control it program with him but our program can be connected to any microscope in any part of the world and it's just one click away that the benefits of being able to scan images via the internet are becoming ever clearer doctors can share information about newly discovered viruses or bacteria as they're scanned and it's also helping to instruct students the world over. it takes only one microscope and each student can work a complete is at the same time as they have all the processes going on in real time a lot of course it's not all seen through rose tinted lens making something this precise requires top quality components and laser accurate engineering coming out today over thirty thousand dollars a piece and the teams efforts to keep the cost of the microscope down and get it

sold a regular frustration of russia's bloated bureaucracy. he thought difficult. last thing with. either. to another country or a theory that is part of that i still hope. some of that warm slabs can start cooperating in how they see the world of the very small it could bring big changes to the worlds of medicine and science in this and other machines the team hopes to build over three hundred microscopes every year by two thousand and fifteen they want them accurate they want them affordable and they want them into connected via the internet so the team and their customers will be watching this space very closely indeed tom watson r.t. moscow. next to look at whether the financial troubles of twenty turn are going to spill over into twenty eleven and what the new year has in store is trends forecaster gerald talks to r.t.

. my first question for you of course is about the economic crisis for the past two years economists journalists every day people have referred to this as a great recession you for many years have been calling this the greatest depression and you say that in two thousand and eleven in this year every citizen is going to

realize it and is going to agree with you why is that because they're running out of school. let's go back to two thousand and the federal reserve of the united states besides the thirteen trillion dollars that they in washington lend spent in the. barrin teed since two thousand and nine they shuffled under the table to banks around the world twenty trillion that's with eighty dollars worth of deals the federal reserve gave these no interest or extremely low interest rate loans to corporations such as general electric or lee davidson so we don't know what schemes they're doing to prop it up but what we're saying that in twenty eleven the game's going on right now how can we can not imagine them coming up with another scheme with it going to begin able to continue whether it's in the us or

the new to print this digital money not worth the paper it's not printed on and you believe that this year according to your trends forecast that as times get tougher the authorities will intensify their efforts to and extract funds needed to meet fiscal obligations what does that mean well that means they're going to try to extract it from the little people and when i say that wake up call look what's going on in europe the people of won't give up what they call or sterile measures this is what it was stair he measured. you know that degree you have in worthlessness that you went to college for you can't get a job oh and by the way those services you're getting we're cutting them oh and those pensions and benefits that your parents are getting or other people are working we're going to cut those two oh and one more thing we're going to raise

your taxes you know that education that's not worth anything. it's going to cost you three times as much to get one particularly in england and that's why they're taking to the streets so that's why we have on one end it's the wake up call and the other one it's screw the people but the people realize what's going on that's the wake up call this is where the revolutions going to happen the youth of the world have and particularly the united states mountains of debt to climb and no way to get to the top and they're seeing the too big to fail is bailed out there seen the gap between the rich and the poor the widest in the united states of any of the industrialized nations so now they have a cause because it's affecting them so what we saw in angel in the again with off with their heads what we saw in italy with the students taking to the streets you're going to see in spain you're going to see if you already sort in

france figure it out what's going on in this cause. is another major trend journalism two point zero the internet has become the great connector they all know what's going on they're all facebook they're all together they have a system where they're interacting and relating cyber war or cyber wars you say is going to be amped up this year why so every major country know. that cyber war and cyber crime are going to be ongoing trends for which every time they come up with a new way to stop a new way to get around it's going to be born the worst conditions get the more you're going to see cyber crime and the worse economic conditions go globally the more you're going to see cyber wars it's going to be

a new element of warfare it's kind of it's a. a it's an internet nuclear bomb waiting to go off every major computer connected industry as service is a potential target for cyber war do you think there's any chance of there being more government control of the internet as the cyber wars increase government control over the net will increase as well along with journalism two point zero we saw with wiki leaks the citizen journalists now people have their own cameras to take films of things that we only used to have film crews for now videos instant they want to crack down on the freedom of information they will use cyber war as another element in the war on terror to take freedom away from us and freedom of net neutrality and by the way the united states is passing

a new net neutrality act orwell couldn't have made up a bed and they there's nothing neutral about the net neutrality that they're talking about it gives government virtually complete control to put anybody at a business as homeland security did during the christmas season when they said that companies violated copyright laws you have no recourse you're gone you're out you're over and we saw it with wiki leaks the greatest fear that governments have our freedom of speech and exposing the corruption this the ineptitude and the double dealing going on that they don't want the public to know about so the freedom of information that goes out they're going to start using cyber war the war on terror as an excuse to take that freedom of the internet away from the people there is a mystery try and i don't know if you'll give it away.