a lot of jargon here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture president obama gave a green light this weekend for u.s. air strikes in libya to stop gadhafi brutal attacks. but if you violate the constitution and not getting the green light from congress for years and the nuclear crisis in japan continues in restarting to see the effects of it on that nation's food supply what do a radiated spinach and milk tell us about just how bad things are in japan. finally

gun deaths in america continue to rise congress doesn't seem willing to do anything about it so is president obama willing to take the lead and pull the trigger on some new gun laws. you need to know this our nation is at war today once again without the constitutionally required debate in congress leading to a declaration of war because john boehner chose to debate defunding n.p.r. and planned parenthood instead leaving the decision to president obama. over the weekend more than one hundred cruise missiles were launched by british american forces into the nation of libya taking out critical air defenses and pave the way for enforcement of the no fly zone above that nation military action comes just hours before a more market off he was about to move into the city of benghazi the last remaining

stronghold of rebel forces and put an end to the uprising that split his nation in two over the last month in response to the years strikes gadhafi open up weapons depots around the nation to arm libyans of the sheen guns and mortars and vowed to give coalition forces in his words a long war his son also responded saying this will connell gadhafi step down will he step aside. or i'm going to step. i can't even describe the whole country united against a militia under armed and the hundred terrorists you are. simply americans and on the record you are supporting picture of armed militia that one day you will. find out that you were supporting the wrong people and that you. would prefer people like that. there are reports that nearly fifty people have died in the

airstrikes with one hundred fifty others injured president obama justified the military action saying we cannot stand idly by when a tyrant tells his people there will be no mercy he also said this today in chile. the international community rallied and said we have to stop. any potential atrocities inside of libya and provided a broad mandate to accomplish that specific tasks as part of that international coalition i authorize the united states military to work. with our international partners to fulfill that mandate now. i also have stated that it is u.s. policy that gadhafi needs to go and we've got a wide range of tools in addition to our military efforts to support that policy so is this a fight we should be involved in and is it even constitutional the way it's been

done joining me on the phone right now to talk about this issue is congressman ron paul republican from texas congressman welcome thank you good to be with you good to talk with you we've talked a number of times on my radio show it's nice to have you here on our television program what's your take on what the president is doing. well i think he wants to be involved obviously but he doesn't want to get his authority from the proper places which to me would be to congress and the constitution he's quite satisfied to get his marching orders from the united nations but that's one issue where the authority comes from the other issue is a nice things for for the american people to get involved in another war sometimes these wars don't go as smoothly as as they tell us i recall on your playing the iraq war it would last just a short while and the oil would pay for all the bills and and we don't have a stable government there and we've been in afghanistan for ten years and we've been working hard

a coalition democrats and republicans we've been working to try to and some wars but here we are just falling into another one i i just think we have since world war two gotten into too many wars carelessly and that we should reassess our foreign policy completely with regard to the u.n. my sense of it was that we took it to them as much as they took it but i think the larger question here is article eight as i recall a section of section one of the constitution that gives the specific powers to congress says in addition to renewing funding only every two years keep it on a short leash that only congress has the power to make war and this is clearly an act of war even if it's been internationally sanctioned by the u.n. didn't in hasn't congress forsaken its responsibility when when john boehner and eric cantor decided to debate n.p.r. and planned parenthood shouldn't they have been talking about libya shouldn't there

have been hearing should there be an expert testimony shouldn't congress the house the senate been deciding whether we're going to participate worse or absolutely and prior to that vote on n.p.r. i had already given a five minute speech arguing that zach point that obama shouldn't go to war that we should be debating is. should be on us lauren it is an act of war to invoke a no fly zone and on a day we were voting on n.p.r. we were also voting on a resolution to come out of out of afghanistan and i made a point on the floor that isn't it rather ironic because as a libertarian i don't vote for many spending bills at all but i thought it was what has ronnie that the conservative republicans were going to. go home and brag about slashing funds on n.p.r. at the same time refusing to touch one nickel of one hundred thirty billion dollar war bill that was clinging to afghanistan and i made

a point i thought it was highly inconsistent and i think you're absolutely right congressman ron paul thanks for dropping by matt thank you here to provide some more insight into this issue john nichols the washington correspondent for the nation magazine john welcome back. tom it's great to be with you thank you congressman because senate suggested the president obama may have actually committed an impeachable offense ralph nader went further and said obama is committing war crimes what's your take on that what you just heard congressman paul said. i think agreeing with my point that this the constitution requires a declaration of war before we. in the absence of a defense of war before we engage ourselves militarily elsewhere. i agree with these points or passionately work on it some years ago and it comes back to again and again in my writing i we had successive presidents since the end of rule or two as well as congresses or participated in the big lie they have

suggested that it is possible for the united states to enter into a war be a treaty with united nations here the war powers act be a series of other. constructions artifices it back to the constitution defines this exceptionally clearly congress must be clear wars and it was you go back to the founding conventions rounding documents on the constitution you would find i am and again and again references to the fact that this language in the constitution regarding congress' responsibility to declare wars was put there because the founders checked into the idea of a monarch launching a war when sending soldiers in to combat it without the approval of the you read the federalist papers i mean and you read madison's notes on the constitution on the constitutional debates and this is one of the few things where the warring

factions that ultimately became the federalist the anti federalism and and whatnot and then the federal us and the democratic republicans they all agree they absolutely all agreed that the body the one the one of the four bodies in particular the house of representatives in the second body the senate that are closest to the people because they had to be reelected every two years over six years respectively had to be the ones who made the decision the the initial decision to take our nation into any kind of political excuse me military action and yet we haven't seen this in vogue since world war two i mean even korea wasn't done this way korea vietnam police actions right to bosnia when it's exactly right so do you think that congress might seize back this power or has this simply become a presidential prerogative to say i'm going to charge i'm declaring a war. well i got afraid congress won't grant back the right even necessarily claim

and this is one of the key elements here there is a handful of members of congress and it's considered ron paul walter jones a couple others who really do get this and who go at it from a stamp out of respect in the constitution but the fact of the matter is that there's a silent conspiracy between leaders of the house and the senate both democrats and republicans and successive presidents to presidents to basically do what they want as regards launching wars and then only if the war goes horribly iraq i will the congress even begin to discuss it and frankly i don't know how terribly right as you know the fact is if he has the chance that disaster and congress still only allows a minimal sort of couple hours of discussion every six or eight months so it's really a disastrous situation tom this is roman empire site activity this is british monarchy type activity where a ruler decides what to do and really leaves the representatives of the people of

the sidelines and it should not be this way doesn't matter whether the war is a guru or a bad war john quincy adams six president and states was exactly right when he said that america should not vote brought searching for monsters to destroy because when we do so willy nilly without concern for our rule of law we also might lead to harm not just to other countries but to this country itself and the sense of this country as a republic not merely some sort of new age or extended reform you know and before him james madison it's no nation can exist as a democracy in a state of can perpetual war which is kind of what we're into john nichols thanks so much for being with us and thank you tom our appreciate it while the causes for our military intervention. libya today may be noble it must be pointed out that this is our third military engagement with the most well known nation in the last

decade and all it takes is one stray missile to further set back our clauses to win hearts and minds in the region so long as the united states is viewed as a as and a bit you will bomb dropper and it will be very difficult to prevent another generation of radicalized muslims who see us the way we saw the british in the seventeen hundreds. it's time for a daily poll your chance to tell us what you think here's today's question should a declaration of war by congress be required every time the usa takes military action against some of the country your options are a yes otherwise it gives the president too much power congress is supposed to clear it declare war or be no congress is too busy talking about n.p.r. and planned parenthood to debate a clarion war on a third country so far the majority of think that only congress should have the authority to declare war by read the constitution but you still have time to tell

us what you think log on to tom hartman dot com to cast your vote will be open until all. japanese officials had yet to restore power to the crippled daiichi nuclear power plant that is leaking deadly radiation into the atmosphere efforts of a critical pool in pumps back on line were delayed today as new white smoke was seen pouring out of mangled reactor three forcing workers to evacuate the area. reactor three remember contains high levels of who tony i'm the deadliest element on the planet artificially produced by reactors that can remain deadly for a quarter million years distributed evenly just one pound of blue tony as if to kill every person on the planet and this reactor in its ways pools contain tons of plutonium and as officials try to contain the situation japan may soon be facing

a food crisis elevated levels of radiation were detected in milk and spinach as far as ninety miles away from the nuclear plant also radioactive iodine and cesium were detected in the tokyo water supply about one hundred seventy miles south of the nuclear plant government officials are saying that levels still don't pose a real health risk to the population but they are alive there is no such thing as a safe level of radiation so what will happen now and just how dangerous is the situation at this moment right now i'm joined by paul gunter director of reactor of reactor oversight at beyond nuclear and linda gunter inter international specialist and co-founder of nuclear power linda welcome back to the program thank you thanks both of us both of you for being with us the. first of all we heard the electricity was on then it was off and it's on and it's off what's the deal with electricity getting to these plants to cool them down well tone the issue is that they have no

late transmission line to the reactor site however that's that's still a far cry from cooking the electricity up to the vital cooling systems monitoring systems for the reactor that show well the levels of activity the temperature and so what so the problem is is that once the electricity is restored they still have to see if the systems are offer bill and right now we're hearing discussions from the u.s. nuclear regulatory commission about maybe bringing in parts spare parts but we're talking about repair operations. no in very high level radiation fields that would certainly pose. dramatic risks to any workers that would try to undertake something that could plea days or hours you know depending on the various components and when they start of the water and didn't they pretty much sign the death warrant for any precision machinery i mean this is the new. crap you know all

kinds of crud in there the the acts of desperation that have brought us to these these will have the consequence on trying to recover it may be that even with the electricity restored that the systems have been damaged of the by salt boy corrosion boy the explosions you know there are a whole host of things now that just raise more questions than they do answers about providing a solution to the ongoing nuclear fires there linda when i first learned about radiation it was rads and rounds you know emitted in absorbed and then it went into something else there was. no one sievert that's right it was it was better also i was living in germany that's where we everybody was talking about records and now its secrets. what does is a secret is a thousand millisieverts. and we've seen a mile west of the plant one thousand nine hundred twenty micro seaver it's all

a micro siebert that would be one point nine millisieverts and so what does that mean well first of all it's a very absorber would be what it means is that the people who are being exposed in multiple ways at high risk around that facility and in fact as you said one hundred miles away the spinach they look at they're finding high rates of iodine in the spinach and in the milk and in the cheeses and they're withdrawing them actually from consumption now so that's the ingestion issues but the other problem is that what we're not hearing. and what is not being measured are gaseous releases from this accident as well so you've got probably a three mile island so you've got radioactive gas is going as seen on you've got krypton is decaying a so-called noble gases all know very well all gases that came into cesium and strontium and so forth and so the doses sort of multiply once you see the multiple ways people can be exposed as the plume pathway what's being deposited on the

ground and so forth and then as you referred to earlier the added risk of plutonium being being released as well which is hard to believe that it's not even what we're seeing so from all these sources human beings are at risk and i think we feel that the that the figures are being downplayed the risk of being downplayed we're in touch actually with a very prominent french majority independent the butcher in france that's been looking at these numbers and saying that you can't because there the way they're measuring the aerial releases is only for aerosols and not for gases you can go ahead and multiply things by ten terms of the doses people are getting and the public the japanese public don't know what's actually being released i don't think anybody knows not only what's been released but what the significance of it is. we're we're out of time but just one quick question in the sort of ice i was quoting john kauffman i told you before used to correspond with back in the seventy's a lot and he often said there is no such thing as a safe level of radiation dose of radiation is an accurate statement well i think

you have to consider when they use a blanket statement like safe does that cover a twenty five year old joe six pack of pregnant jordan in general you know look this is critical it's and it's indorsed by the national academy of sciences as well that there are no safe level there's no that there's no say there's no such thing as no safe dose and because we are exposed her background radiation any additional dose is therefore additionally very thank you very much thank you. well this crisis unfolds in japan there's something the u.s. media is ignoring that's our own spotty record when it comes to nuclear safety let me lay this this is. pretty amazing stuff the nuclear power plants here in the united states here's a map of the united states first of all what is the n.r.c. say about this is this information by the way from the union of concerned scientists and in their findings they made to state a nuclear power plants continue to experience problems with safety related equipment and worker errors that increase the risk of damage to the reactor core and that's. to the employees of the public nuclear power plants continue to

experience problems so what are these problems so let's look at a few of them is actually a fairly long list i'm just pulling five out. for example diable kannur diablo canyon california what's actually been going on there right here this is you know pacific gas and electric this from the n.r.c. or from the in you concerned scientists the n.r.c. by of the union of concerned scientists a misguided repair to valves that would not open fast enough preventer other key valves for opening tests after the valve repairs failed to detect the problem. then there were the reactor operator for nearly eighteen months this reactor operated for eighteen months with out its emergency systems would be with the emergency systems disabled. the next one is in fort calhoun open near omaha nebraska. in this case ok so this reactor pumps an emergency water make up system failed repeatedly over several years the plant owner never identified the true cause of

the failures and therefore did not take the right steps to prevent the recurrence in hill robinson in florence south carolina on the thirty first anniversary of three mile island this event revisited nearly all the problems that caused that meltdown bad design poor maintenance of problematic you quote either in an inadequate operating performance and poor training and in surgery newport news virginia the next one after an inadvertent shutdown of the union you know one reactor the fire began in the control room due to an overheated electrical component similar component in unit two company didn't take steps to protect the unit one from the problem identified in unit two and wolf creek in burlington kansas seven hours after the reactor shut down automatically because of a problem with electrical grid and n.r.c. inspector found water leaking from the system that cools the diesel generators and two thousand studies seven study had forecast the leakage and a leak actually occurred after the reactor shut down in two thousand and eight i

ever the owner it says has taken few problems to correct this steps to take this problem is a real problem. coming out the days of social security is a critical safety net for millions may soon be a distant memory see our gang of deluded democrats be assist the drug that the republican party and giving away social security to bankers on wall street.

it looks like republicans may win another battle in congress and those of us who expect social security when we're all over could be screwed because of it a gang of six senators including democrats mark warner dick durbin and can't conrad are crafting a proposal to cut social security benefits and raise the retirement age to reduce our nation's deficit all along republicans have been calling for social security cuts mainly because they want to turn over to goldman sachs a two point seven trillion dollar money from which they can skim billions as profits they can then be recycled back as campaign contributions is all republican how about one hundred thirty five this even though social security is projected to be fully solvent through at least twenty thirty seven and has no effect on our nation's deficit and is easily fixed by simply asking rich people to pay the same

percentage of their income in social security taxes as you and me with a handful of democrats showing support for the republicans agenda it may be only a matter of time before this critical safety net begins to tear down cats can stand up to the program that they created nearly eighty years ago and what can see in. social security is not in danger let's just. lay some of these. i was going say mince lies. just has to put them down put them down for social security is not in danger here is this is from the soul security administration. actually from the center on budget and policy priorities so security administration so security surplus this is this is the surplus this is the leftover money there's a reason for this by the way and that is up until ninety in the early one nine hundred eighty s. every generation paid for the previous generations retirement in other words the

working people were paying for grampa's retirement or had retirement as the case may be. but thirty in the one nine hundred eighty s. reagan doubled the the social security tax on working people and did in vision of that created a separate trust fund savings account because they saw these boomers coming this you know rather going through a python and they saw that by two thousand and twelve twenty fifteen twenty twenty that they would be so many boomers retiring that they'd have to raise a so scary tax is really high then and so these that let's have this one generation the boomers now we pay for their parents to pay for themselves this is the first generation since social security was founded it is pain not for one generation's retirement but for two for their parents just retirement and for their own retirement and so what they did is they started if we go back to the original slide the one before this but we can't ok we started setting aside money into the social security trust fund and if you look year by year you see the trust fund going up the reserves in the social security trust fund going up now this is ok what we're

looking at here in billion us ok by two thousand and twenty here we are here to here this is now it's going to go up to three trillion these are trillion dollars three trillion dollars three point one trillion dollars then ben the boomers start retiring i keep in mind this is money boomers set aside to pay for their own retirement. and as they start retiring as it is supposed to do by the time they're all dead or dying and by two thousand and forty more or less the boomers you know another twenty thirty years from now by two thousand and forty forty forty twenty forty five the so security trust fund will be exhausted now that's the way it was actually supposed to work. the way it was supposed to work is that this should have come out about another five or six maybe eight years and so that's that's it let's go to the next slide here social security's costs remain stable over time when the boomers all start to retire we're going to have to have

a few more people to pass out their checks but this is not a for profit operations there's not c.e.o.'s and dividends all i kind of stuff the payout so the cost of administering social security which right now is around five percent is going to go up to around six to happiness and then and then even out because you know it's just a few more people it's not it's not this huge thing the cost of extending the cuts but here's here's the the social security short for as the the social security so short for as a share of g.d.p. cheeping which won't happen until twenty twenty seven the program is solvent until twenty twenty seven and then it pays about seventy percent of what is pain and will forever but to bring it back up to one hundred percent there is that shortfall what is that it's about seven tenths of g.d.p. which by coincidence the so scary shortfall seven tenths of g.d.p. is an identical amount of money as the cost of extending tax provisions exclusively for upper income taxpayers we're talking about the bush tax cuts for rich people we

simply didn't way with those then then you've got the problem social security shortfall solved. and solved rather poorly frankly. look at all these are the kind this is the o.e.c.d. the developed countries there is a should economic cooperation development this is the economic country sixty percent of your lifetime salary that's your retirement average in sweden switzerland italy hungary austria spain turkey denmark. the slovak republic norway finland but it will hit where's the united states where the united states go oh it's a down there on the bottom forty percent we we are billionaires pay the lowest taxes we have the greatest inequality in the world and our working people get screwed the most when they retire. so but nonetheless the money is still

going to be there this is so security reduces if if the number right now the number of seniors in poverty is about ten percent if we deal with if we did away with social security it would jump to forty five percent that's why so scared is important it's a it's a program to prevent old age poverty period coming up in the big picture more than two months after the tragedy in tucson are we passed two and tighter gun control laws will debate the issue next. a new website with twenty four seven live streaming news towns like to tell you about the ongoing financial hardship unlimited free high quality videos for download. and stories you never find on main street. that is a political.