and as we fight over the second amendment how does our love of guns look to other countries around the world and ben cohen will join me on that debate then will continue investigating the questionable relationship between the washington post and a for profit college the prestigious paper who once dedicated itself to news has sold out proving that it's all about the money these days christopher chambers will join me to talk about the evolution of the washington post and the dependence of other news organizations on making money on the site now in light of the upcoming vote to raise the debt ceiling some republican leaders are making threats of actually allowing the u.s. to default but don't worry they've got a plan they're planning on paying off our debt to china and japan before taking care of the people here at home talking points memo brian butler will join me to hash out all the details of this ridiculous proposal at the end of the show but now let's move on to our top story. protests in egypt continued today and today they became violent men who many claim were plainclothes police officers throw through

the square on camel and horseback with whips bus loads of pro barak supporters also being alleged to be police began clashing with those calling for mubarak to leave molotov cocktails were thrown rocks concrete tear gas was reported and journalists were also attacked and estimated five hundred people were injured in tahrir square the entire world continues to watch now the obama administration has said little today they condemned the violence saying that it must stop if and when it does who will the key players be here to discuss it with me is to investigative journalist and colonel lawrence wilkerson former chief of staff to colin powell gentlemen thank you both for joining me tonight now today we saw you know what for the most part has been a peaceful protest over the last week turned violent and there were a lot of calls that this was actually all part of mubarak's crackdown that these people that were sent in by him that these are plainclothes police officers. do you

think that there is you know any value to that statement i think it's true. i think this is. i have no idea of know if if it is true but i think this is standard dictator practice and when you really lose the things you see in people into the street police dressed in civvies maybe even some soldiers dressed in cities and you start some violence and then you say you got to quell this and they knew it and saw of course according to him when he hears that the people want him to leave and they want a revolution he says ok i hear what you say eight months from now i'll be happy to make my way out now let's talk about you know the response from u.s. officials from the obama administration it's been rather muted and they've been getting a lot of flak for that first i want your opinions on you know what you think about the fact that well they haven't said very much but first of all i think it's very unfortunate we're in this situation again we're we're dealing with a dictator we've supported for this time for thirty years and we get to this point and the dictator lose the support and suddenly we're struggling with what to do it

seems to me that we should begin with not supporting dictators for so long not backing them so fully and then we might be able be prepared when the people rise up we're in a bad situation yeah really because it was so easy unfortunately our history has is you know wrapped up in a very complicated world in a very complicated foreign policy what do you say once it's a very complicated balls he like you said but it's also complicated by something we don't seem to be rational about anymore and that's israel. i'm quite confident that the leadership until a bit right now is begging the president not to do not to depart from his previous policy not to abandon mubarak and that makes it extremely difficult on the white house when it's such a vivid special interest in this country and you know one of the things also is that we hear from lawmakers that well you know we're america we support democracy but then we get into situations like this when you have to question whether you. i

only support democracy if it also suits america's interests and you know while the white house has been slightly mute on this issue we've heard a lot especially from a lot of conservative pundits and i actually want to play you a clip from tucker carlson who was on fox last night let's take a listen to that. it's possible a country like egypt also a country like saudi arabia also a country like pakistan if you let the majority of people decide to form a government they would wind up with a wacko anti western it's a democratic repressive government it wasn't very good. then what's the point so what's he saying we should never allowed for democracy in these countries we should never support elections and open open and honest a lot of research i think exactly what are the brains said the same thing about new york and philadelphia and so forth but i just wondered is that really this land that so many people in washington do you take with so many people really believe but they just can't say it out loud because it's politically incorrect well right i don't argue from a strategic point of view that it wouldn't be quite

a challenge for us if a government let's say similar to the one that took over in seventy nine in iran more to take over in cairo i don't see that as a possibility though i think it's a very different situation in comparing the two as some of my new conservative former colleagues are doing now is a little bit ridiculous if you look at the line that's being promoted and i've been watching closely for the last few nights they're trying to promote this idea that the muslim brotherhood is about to take over and even possibly and there's just going to be this radical takeover that they don't they're not really paying any attention to the actual groups that are in the streets these are labor unions these are students these are neighborhood associations these are the masses of people regular people rising up saying they've had enough and they want to change and i think that's unfortunately where you know we haven't been on their side i think we should be speaking for those people there's a lot of torture in egypt i know as you know trade unionists are regularly brought in by these security police who. you know who the fights were with the beginning of

this struggle there are the people really doing the harm to the people and i think we should be and that's where we should be on the people side let me just say as we the bush administration happy you mention that you know there's a use to egypt to torture some of al qaeda well then let's talk about some of the people that we don't know yet what will happen in the next coming days if may leave may step down if the violence is going to continue but there are some figures that we'd like to focus on and so since we're talking about torture let's talk about someone who works very closely with the u.s. in this sense and that is omar suleiman now he has now been promoted to to the vice president and recently thanks to mubarak reshuffling his cabinet apparently that's what he thought the people wanted but you know how much clout does this guy actually have me with the people will not accept him being in power while there i think we're looking at an attempt to continue the thirty go all the way back to nasser the one institution in the that's disciplined orderly and very powerful is

the military and that's really where these people have come from for the past decades that is an attempt to continue that i'm not sure it's going to work i'm not saying it wouldn't work with someone who didn't come with the credentials that has but i don't think it's going to work with him in particular but what i've seen in my own experience i want to i think iran is a good situation to compare this to but i also think if you look back to seventy nine and one nine hundred eighty look at south korea where there was a dictator a military dictator we supported for twenty years who was assassinated and then there was a period of time after that where people rose up and said we don't want any more dictatorship and that at that time the carter administration struggled with what to do and we ended up with a worse situation than before because we didn't support the people and the military took over in a severe crackdown were hundreds of people were were actually killed so i think we've got to be very careful and make sure that the people of egypt know where we stand and that's where i think the obama. administration has made

a mistake by not making what i would just add that is one of the things that concerns me there doesn't seem to be anyone that could coalesce this is people's movement if you will and present himself or herself as a leader. that leads me to believe that the military probably has to go up on this but i agree it should be the egyptian people who decide well that is of course you know what makes this situation so hard to really gauge the fact that this is a leaderless revolution and a lot of people have been propping up. even though he hasn't even been in the country for forty years and they've got that we are perhaps this would be the easiest guy to transition with but then you know the really the only organized group that is an opposition group in egypt you know perhaps the largest opposition group then is the muslim brotherhood so what happens if the muslim brotherhood if a man like mohammed but i who is the new leader of the muslim brotherhood to come into power if the people do choose to elect. it's not it's not beyond the realm of

possibility i think back to when dr rice the secretary of state was discounting a mosque and you know course abbas was elected i don't think it's quite the same situation though i do have a concern though as i said about there not being anyone else right now at least he seems like he could wear the mantle of leadership and be acceptable but who could take advantage of that situation right now well the muslim brotherhood could but i don't see them having enough power to stand up against the other elements that are in this group as was pointed out you know there was an answer interesting incident the other day where there was a chance going on about you know god is great the muslim and people started saying no egypt is great they tried to say you know we're all egypt since here there's lots of christians there and i think there's a sense of a lot of people i get from watching al-jazeera and listening to the media reports is that there is a sense that they don't want the most they want they really want the groups that have been out there that have been suffering at the hands of this government to

somehow be able to take power and have a democratic elections where they can choose their own people and their parliament is not elected those elections are rigged also and i want to add that i think that the key relationship here is between the u.s. and the egyptian military it's a very close relationship one in the world can talk about that he knows more about that but we have to watch it very closely but what about general mohamed is he a key player then since he is in fact in control of the military their military hasn't been a been standing down they haven't been doing anything but i can't discount the military because as i said they are the the huge institution well armed and so forth i've been pleasantly surprised by the fact that they have not jumped on the people even apparently as the violence started today. that a leader might calm from their ranks is certainly conceivable now very quickly i want to move this situation a little bit beyond egypt because after the revolution in tunisia then it moved to

egypt now are seeing a lot of unrest. and other countries other countries where we have close relationships with these people who also could be considered dictators and you know we're not sure yet how far that might go but we think about our relationship with saudi arabia with yemen with jordan these are countries are we gives we just signed a sixty billion dollar weapons deal with the saudis this is one of the most oppressive regimes in the entire world and you know. to try and get some of those petro dollars back that we've been shifting in the world i mean well you guys are right i mean again today it is this comes down to oil them but so what happens if this goes farther in some of these other countries. one of the big factors is going to be the economic situation in the different countries i mean in egypt i forget what the unemployment rate is but it's enormous you know forty fifty percent very very high so there's a lot of people out there that have no means to support themselves that are out there in the streets the same is not true in say saudi arabia although the dictatorship there it's very much of a dictatorship still very much what do we still support democracy if suddenly all

of our allies start toppling i think you pick one out of that you pick one out of three would be human but i guarantee you the leadership will bring out the force and kill people so you know a little bit concerned about it catching on in yemen because i don't think he will stop at all and bring on the ball now very quickly before we finish this hour we spoke in a little bit about fox news coverage how according to fox news the muslim brotherhood is taking over and that means your heart is taking over and it's going to be the end of the world but let's talk about some of the other media coverage out there meanwhile elkhart is down to about two hundred operatives in the fall. that's right you can't tell anybody that their eyes are sarwar for or out of that's the biggest secret in the world but so what do you think that you know c.n.n. has been covering this m s n b c i've been covering this are they almost a little bit too optimistic here when we hear the word democracy. i finally saw

some good coverage last night on n.b.c. i thought their coverage was outstanding and you know reporters like richard engel were getting out there and really telling the story about the people that are in the streets and you know women's groups that are out there leading and helping to organize and this kind of thing that that really gives americans a picture of what's going on but by far the best coverage as you as you well know is al-jazeera they've been out there every day they had people there in the beginning our media was you know they're getting there in the last couple days but our media coverage has not been it's not in their best best moment they're finally they're now in their folly you know really digging into the story but it's taken a long time let me just say that i've had a couple of conversations with the outstanding young man they want to con former director general of the al jazeera network i thought i was talking to thomas jefferson. all right gentlemen i want to thank you very much for joining us and of course we will continue following the situation as it goes on thank you for what is still much more to come tonight the gun debate all relevant. but is the right to

bear arms becoming a little bit more of an obsession and how does that look to the rest of the world. specially. for. what. became the. in a free flow. really

you deleted. from. the future however. it's been a week since the tucson massacre took place but the debate over gun control is still front and center as millions continue to defend their second amendment rights they're faced with plenty of opposition but good as are becoming a little bit more of an obsession than just a right archies lauren lyster finds out. unlike many other countries in the united states guns can be found everywhere from retail stores this particular want to six hundred dollars my personal a springfield x t forty five two rallies it's a river ten twenty two it's easy to air use the hands of politicians running for office commodores and john mcmillan because he gives a rip about alabama and i better not care to new codes or criminals the. many

readily cite the country's second amendment that allows for this right to bear arms the vast majority of level headed americans realize it is a constitutional right and as such they probably don't have a problem with it. but with a population of three hundred seven million people and roughly three hundred million firearms owned by civilians in the united states what's a constitutional right is now feared by some sixty to become an obsession in the twenty first century thing that people do in the urban areas the machine guns and the forty seven and so on is it buster of an obsession that can't be ignored considering recent acts of gun violence and the ease of access to firearms so in the united states for the average citizen like myself to purchase a gun i need to go through a background check with the federal government looking for anything from criminal

history to mental illness and if i pass that you get anything from a handgun like you see here to a semiautomatic weapon which these are over here and even an automatic weapon like a machine gun that they're. semiautomatic weapons like those you see here in the catskill mountains of new york. were jewish americans argued their firing off their second amendment rights to guard against the threat of terrorism we need to express those rights we need to own weapons we need to protect ourselves handguns like you see on the hips of store owners. just near the nation's capital or to move to a southern town where gun ownership is actually mandatory in the south a gun is just part of the household just like a hammer isn't the tools last. a tool a sporting good a means of self-defense or murder however you describe it gun owners say it's more than a firearm it's a symbol centrals to american culture and identity when informed men stemming from

a revolution. to cowboys to any that kind of thing i mean the gun is actually a centerpiece of american history. a piece of history that critics say continues to warn the country what is the percentage of people who shall say they were which is but those that go maybe five ten percent of the fifty five or thirty percent of. the very dangerous for the social piece of the nation i guess lauren sister r.t.e. and chamber not of washington d.c. . so as gun ownership becoming one of obsession that a right side of the debate has become a political tool used by both sides last month lawmakers in south dakota introduced legislation that would require any adult twenty one or older to buy a firearm not because they actually believe that would pass or that it should be required but to prove

a point that they don't believe the government can mandate that citizens should purchase health care then a video came out from a group of undercover officers that new york city mayor michael bloomberg had sent to a gun show in phoenix arizona where they proved that the background check system can fail i don't matter which side you fall on the debate over guns is seen as and her only american the u.s. leads the world in gun ownership ninety guns per one hundred people but we also far away lead the world in gun violence and gun deaths what thirty thousand americans dying every year because of it so how does that look to the rest of the world to. discuss to see motley president of less government and from our los angeles studio ben cohen editor of the daily banter gentlemen thank you both for joining us thank you for joining me i guess and everyone here then going to start with you what do you say here do you think that people have taken something that isn't right that's written into the constitution and maybe taken a little too far turn it into an obsession. oh yes you know it's definitely right

this from the u.k. perspective it's quite bizarre coach of the session with owning a gun i can understand that is part of the american psyche of american culture but the bringing guns to political rallies and. protests in the right so bear arms schools and restaurants and it's kind of bordering on insane. what do you say to that scene when i think it's the british culture is bizarre where people get robbed in their homes because they can't defend themselves with a gun their whole their at their house the break with the burglar breaks in especially elderly people and robbed them while they're in a home i also think it's absurd to tell one hundred pound woman that you can't buy a gun to defend yourself from a two hundred pound rapist because it bothers somebody sensibilities but the question i'm asking here is why does it always have to be the center of every political debate i mean if you ask me the fact that we're talking about we're

talking about health care and somehow someone decides to create legislation in south dakota to say well if you're going to force me to have health care i'm going to force you to have a gun that's just crazy really where we're are with i already as well but look at the fact that as a result of the code is that without its use of the south dakota. the reason it continues to be a debate is because it's ingrained it's inherent it's it was a right in the constitution and people keep trying to take it away so of course it's going to continue to try to take it away though barack obama hasn't tried to take it away no but there's but but every time there's a conversation. about gun control it's it's inherently unconstitutional to discuss that this is a misnomer this is a misnomer it's a claim that people were trying to say your gun rights away that's not true people are trying to intelligently legislate gun control well this is congress. let me finish let me finish ok you call it stock or it seems to to speaks about robberies

in the u.k. and hundred pound where we're looking to defend themselves the statistics speak for themselves you have the highest homicide rate in the western world you've got such a thousand people dying a year from from guns mostly suicides of course. it's first of all they're mostly suicides second of all. you know on suicides would twelve thousand dollars i was. mostly suicide i was all right murder right it's the u.k. yes but we also had one to do with the robbery rate and be beyond that but what are you saying to a robbery is not going to be i would run around and say someone dying is a little more dramatic than he's done but if a woman is getting raped and shoots them and shoots the rapist i don't give a i don't care that the guy died well since you brought that up i mean this is the thing also that i obviously find very often frustrating is that we hear from people especially on the right that they don't want the government interfering in their lives they don't want the government touching their guns don't believe that these are often the same people that are very keen on the government telling you who you

can marry and telling you what you can do when it comes to an abortion when you have been raped with which to me are some of those purse well but abortion is were not worried about your rights away but the right to the person you're killing so that's the there is a there is an individual rights issue whether i want to but it's still my right ear right when i thought about me with what i just told i'm going to for just talking about you but badly do you think that there's a bit of a you know priority makes up when americans think that guns are more important than health care. yeah it's definitely for for marco. it's of at least i think there's a different approach the issue that the right to bear arms is more important than the right to free health care because there is iran's downsides additional right to health care it's not in the constitution the constitution mentions a lawyer it doesn't mention a doctor and it mentions guns it doesn't mention health care which should health care be something that we care about i mean we keep jumping back to the current one everything if you care about the last the last entity you want involved in is government because they stink at doing everything they want to settle is this you

this is getting city because they said people people like mr or mr moore that you know interested in solving problems who introduced him into the solving the ideology and ideology that doesn't work i realize you lose your support and. your quote unquote solutions or involving government and that's the end yes this is yes mark my question and she's also a result of government because government works where i'm sorry i just i should work where where when did the banking but with the banking bailout who stepped in to fix that with the free market private companies probably. disaster the banking bailout is about. the economy would be you wouldn't you wouldn't be on television now to that isn't that just the sort of you know you can't produce proven nonentity you can't disprove it it would be worse if we didn't do that that's a non starter argument i let me on what he did you are you seriously argue are you seriously arguing that the government didn't need to step in yes absolutely i. need

a little serious you're getting more serious if you say you don't know what you are talking to so in a free market society i do because that you have government intervention in the free market we the banks we essentially stopped a giant depression you know we chose losers oh it wasn't on what we did. it was the governments that let me bring up another point here quickly gentlemen you know i think the one thing that many people brought up is that yes americans where very and guns are not we i am not but some americans that many americans are very. to their guns america also considers itself a leader in the world we take a very moralistic stance on many things but when we have the highest rates of gun violence and gun deaths does that somehow diminish the say that we should hurry before we want to have a gun is used to commit a crime and choose three times to prevent it and that's a statistic nobody talks about so very one time somebody robs a bank with a gun three crimes are prevented by using

a gun so. the noise the motorways sort of are the so why it was just almost right. just to get to see you here if you use euro zone as the example let's say we also don't go in there as you already have the highest on the side right just to use euro zone as an example of somebody besides law for about a gun there would have been less murder while there were some witnesses i know the right out of the did have guns but at certain points too late if somebody comes up to you point blank in the head and there's no time to draw years later a better result but again we have to wrap it up then quickly though to answer that question do you think that it diminishes somehow you know america say if you can keep your own house in order. to study controversial opinion i don't necessarily think that's true i think america has a lot of great things going for it and i think the gun issue is its own issue and it's a problem the i have with american society but i don't think the trucks from. from the society which i thank you for that but in fact. i who ever thought that was

controversial i was asking you for your opinion all right gentlemen i thank you both very much for joining us today now still to come on tonight's show talking i doubt president to pay off yet tonight we're going to call out a political organization that is just desperate to make a little money and it's one of the world's leading newspapers the washington post i do know that the post parent company has cashing in by taking money christine for is our report on that later in the program. wealthy british style. let's go. down. market why not. find out what's really happening to the global economy with much stronger for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune in to your reports on

our. again this is all to the headlines. the violent unrest in turkey finds in egypt as supporters of the impossible president hosni mubarak take to the streets of cairo for the first time to clash with those who want him out after thirty years of rule egypt's neighbors are looking all eyes for sleep as turmoil continues while a new phase in middle east history of holds. u.s. president barack obama a sign of a new start a new thread on scot's treaty meaning the deal between russia and america to reduce nuclear weapons will both live in just days it replaces the nineteen lines who want to greenland which run started a year ago that it will refuse but country's nuclear arsenals by rockets that. are

the most go to war as a retaliation i want it says is on ends on sunday's expulsion of a diplomat dublin claims russian intelligence made fake irish polls for slate squiring and lost in the us last. that's the headline is now the second part of the guys coming up next. for the full story we've gone to. the biggest issues get a human voice face to face with the news makers. of time for tonight's tool time award now in the former chairman of the republican national committee was voted out last month many in the party were relieved they say that michael steele was a loose cannon that he mistook managed the r. and c. for two years and now we're learning just how bad his missed.