well on charm and 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 get off his brutal attacks. but if you violate the constitution and not getting the green light from congress first and a 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 it 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 and even 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 to pave the way for enforcement of the no fly zone above that nation military action comes just hours for moammar gadhafi was about to move into the city of benghazi the last

remaining stronghold of rebel forces and put an end of the uprising that split his nation in two over the last month in response to years strikes gadhafi opened 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 connel gadhafi step down will he step aside. i'm interested. i can do to describe the whole country united against the british there under under two hundred hundred terrorists you are. simply you americans and other wicked are supporting terrorists and. one day you rick up find out and work for the wrong people and that you. would support people people like.

there are reports that nearly fifty people have died near strikes 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 authorized 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. 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 they were 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 been expert testimony shouldn't congress the house and 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 a floor and it is an act of war to invoke a no fly zone but on a day we were voting on the 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 because as a libertarian i don't vote for many spending bills at all but i thought it was rather ironic that the conservative republicans were going to. go home and brag about slashing funds out of n.p.r. at the same time refusing to touch one nickel of one hundred thirty day the in dollar war bionics kling in 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 tonight thank you very provides more insight into this issue john nichols the washington correspondent for the nation magazine john welcome back com it's great to be with you thank you congressman because senate judge suggested the president obama may have actually committed an impeachable offense ralph nader run 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 constitution requires a declaration of war before we in the absence of a defense of war or we engage ourselves militarily elsewhere. i agree with these points are passionate written a book on it some years ago and it comes back again and again in my writing i we at successive presidents since the end of world war two as well as congresses

are interested in the big lie they have suggested that it is possible for the united states to enter into a war be a tree united nations here that work hours act be a series of other. constructions artifices to get back to the constitution defines this exceptionally clearly congress must be clear wars and if you go back to the founding conventions pounding documents beyond the constitution you were trying to 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 objected to the idea of a monarch launching a war when sending soldiers into combat without the approval of the e.u. read the federalist papers i mean and you read madison's notes on the constitution on their 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 agreed 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 of research respectively had to be the ones who made the decision the initial decision to take our nation into any kind of political. 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 bosnia one that's exactly right so do you think that congress might seize back this power or has this simply because a presidential prerogative to say i'm in charge i'm declaring a war. well i don't for a congress won't back the right even as a terrible thing 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 standpoint 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 allow 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 thorough right as you know the fact is if he has the chance of 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 by activity this is british monarchy type activity where a ruler decides what to do and really leaves the representatives of the people on

the sidelines and it should not be this way doesn't matter whether the war is a who're or a bad or john quincy adams six president states was exactly right when he said that america should not go abroad searching for monsters to destroy because when we do so willy nilly without concern for our rule of law we alternately do our not just to other countries but to this country and a 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 a no nation can exist no 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 the bank you talk about appreciate it well 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 muslim the nation in the last decade

and all it takes is one stray missile to further set back our cause is to win hearts and minds in the region so long as the united states is viewed as a as and a bitch will bomb dropper that it will be very difficult to prevent another generation of radicalized muslims who see us the way we saw the british in the seventy nine it's. it's time for our 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 in some of the country your options are a yes otherwise it gives the president too much power congress is supposed to clear to 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 and i read the constitution but you still have time to

tell us what you think log on to thom hartmann dot com to cast your vote poll be open until tomorrow. japanese officials have yet to restore power to the crippled daiichi nuclear power plant that is leaking deadly radiation into the atmosphere efforts to build critical pooling 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 you 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 bluestone is enough to kill every person on the planet and this reactor in its way schools 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 and reactor of reactor oversight of beyond nuclear and linda gunter enter an international specialist and co-founder of nuclear 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 then it's on then 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 a still a far cry from hooking the electricity up to the final cooling systems monitoring systems for the reactor that show though the levels of activity the temperature and so what so the problem is that once the electricity is restored they still have to see if the systems are all proposed 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 take 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. 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 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 the well known seaver that's right it was it was back when i was living in germany and so we everybody was talking about it and now it's secrets. what is this a secret is a thousand millisieverts. and we've seen a mile west of the plant one thousand eight hundred twenty micro seaver it's all

a micro siebert that would be one point nine or it's and so what does that mean well first of all it's absorbed or really 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 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 actually ingestion issues but the other problem is that what we're not hearing. and what is not being measured of the gas is releases from this accident as well so you've got robin hood of three mile island so you've got radioactive gas is going to seen on you've got krypton is decay is so-called noble gases already where it will gases that it came to 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 in 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 authority independent the butcher in france that's been looking at these numbers and saying that you can't because they're 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 setup i saw i was quoting john and 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 so it was a very 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 but you have been in general look at the concrete comments and it's indorsed by the national academy of sciences as well good there are safe there's no that there's no say that there is no such thing as no safe dose and because we are exposed to a background radiation any additional dose is therefore additionally of great thank you very much because you know. all this crisis unfolds in japan or something the u.s. media is ignoring that's our own spotty record when it comes to nuclear safety regulators this is. pretty amazing stuff. nuclear power plants here in the united states fact here's a map of the united states first of all what does 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 the 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 and the public nuclear power plants continue to

experience problems so what are these problems well let's look at a few of them is actually a fairly long list i'm just pulling five out. for example diablo candy or 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 unit concerned science is the n.r.c. via the union of concerned scientists a misguided repair valves that would not open fast enough preventer other key opening tests after the valve repairs failed to detect the problem. then there were the reactor operated for nearly eighteen months this reactor operated for eighteen months with out its emergency systems with the with the emergency systems disabled . the next one is in fort calhoun open near on the honey brisket. 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 said in florence south carolina on the thirty first anniversary of three mile island this event we visited nearly all the problems that caused that meltdown bad design poor maintenance of problematic equipment either in an inadequate operator performance and poor training and in surgery newport news just 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 union 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. inspectors found water leaking from the system that cools the immediate 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

however the owner it says has taken few problems to correct this steps to take this problem as a real problem. coming up the days of social security as a critical safety net for millions may soon be a distant memory see a gang of deluded democrats be assist the drug that the republican party and giving away social security to the 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 his campaign contributions is all republican trick although it actually one hundred thirty five this even goes 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 now for the republicans agenda it may be only a matter of time before this critical safety net begins that's at or and democrats can stand up for the program that they created nearly eighty years ago and what. social security is not in danger let's just way some of these i was going to say minutes. ago let's just just put them down put them down forever social security is not danger here is this is from so security administration. actually from the center on budget and policy priorities via social security administration so security surplus this is this is the surplus this is the left over money now 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 other words the

working people are paying for grampa's retirement or dead retirement as the case may be. but it's already in the one nine hundred eighty s. reagan doubled the the social security tax on working people and did in addition to that created a separate trust fund savings account because they saw these boomers coming as you know rather going through a python and they saw that by twenty twelve twenty fifteen twenty twenty that there would be so many boomers retiring that they'd have to raise a so scary tax is really high then and so they said let's have this one generation the boomers now would pay for their parents pay for themselves this is the first generations and social security was founded that is pay not for one generation's retirement but for two for their parents retirement and for their own retirement and so what they did is they started if you go back to the original slide the one before this or we can 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 then 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 in another twenty thirty years from now by two thousand and forty forty forty twenty forty five these social security trust fund will be exhausted now that's the way it was actually supposed to work. the way it was supposed to work as a poseur should it 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 and i kind of stuff the payout so the cost of administering social security which right now is around five percent is going to go around six and a half percent 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. well here's here's the the social security shortfall at as the the social security. as a share of g.d.p. g.d.p. which want to happen until two thousand and twenty seven keep in mind the program is solvent until twenty twenty seven and then it pays about seventy percent of what it's paint and will forever but to bring it back up to one hundred percent there is that shortfall of what is that it's about seven tenths of g.d.p. which by coincidence the social security shortfall seven tenths of g.d.p. is an identical about a 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 did

a way with those then and then you've got the problem social security shortfall solved. and solved rather poorly frankly look at all these other kind of 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 way down there in 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 it reduces if if the number right now the number of seniors in poverty is about ten percent if we deal if we did away with social security it would jump to forty five percent that's why so security's important it's a it's a program to prevent old age poverty period. coming up on the big picture more than two months after the tragedy in tucson are we past due and tighter gun control laws will debate the issue next. new web site with twenty four seven live streaming news towns what to do about the ongoing financial hurricane unlimited free high quality videos for download. and stories you never find on mainstream news. companies that will sell me the political ticker.