but in the alone a show at the real headlines with none of the mercy we live out of washington d.c. now today marks the thirteenth day of the u.s. and nato involvement in libya and as our coverage continues we'll comp little rapper low key to give us his perspective on yet another war but on capitol hill congress held meetings on libya without parole mike mullen and robert gates today so have details on what was discussed and we'll find out if a clear mission with clear goals has finally been created and we'll have details on

the latest court of appeals ruling which justifies keeping a good mo detainee without any proof that he was actually involved with al qaeda so we'll bring you details on this ruling and will determine if it's just another glaring example of obama going back on his promise about closing guantanamo bay next we'll look into how the mainstream media is covering libya when i guess n.b.c. host made a very strong statements on the show last night which leads us to ask if the mainstream media is choosing partisanship over analysis and then could there really be a silver lining to the budget big growing in congress the democrats and republicans may have finally reached an agreement about probably won't make the tea party very happy considering that they took their anger to d.c. to protest today so what's going to happen next we'll find out the answer to that and much more in tonight's show but first our top story. nato has now officially taken sole command for air strikes over libya and they debuted a brand new flashing title operation that unified protector. but this operation

seems to be anything but unified with the international community's play on whether or not to arm the rebels or how else to get off he to go while the higher powers squabble amongst themselves as to how to conduct a war that they jumped into without an end game let's not forget that the people of all countries involved are still wondering why we're there to begin with earlier i caught up with british political rapper low key i first asked him what he made of the new war that our countries are engaged in and i did note that at least the british parliament got to vote on the matter whereas president obama just made the decision on his own. where i think is interesting because there was a poll. in this country about whether the public. favored this action majority did not and i think for a government that goes to war against the wishes of its population to talk about dictatorships anywhere else is absurd. now you said earlier today too that the

bombing of libya is not about removing gadhafi but it's about sustaining a civil war why do you say that i mean whose interest would it play into in order for there to be a continued civil conflict there. it would play into the interests of people who be a east systems precisely. arms manufacturer profit every single day there is war in times of war they profit of course it's in the interests of b.p. who have huge interests in the region having a another thing about imperialism is it doesn't just invade countries it actually makes maps so in terms of dividing the country and keeping the country divided time when there are genuine revolutions in genuine are praising is happening next door in egypt and tunisia and imperial presence in the country and an indefinite foreign presence in the country will really work as an influence and in effect attempt to

co-opt the revolutions which are taking place next door which have taken place on the still in the process of developing next to the so what's going on libya is definitely quite a difference from the arab spring and the actual revolutions that we've seen going on you know throughout the middle east and north africa versus bunning are way into it but what do you make of the idea of arming the rebels of course it's a little funny to start arming rebels when it was western governments that aren't khadafi to begin with but i feel like we see this story play out all the time. exactly you see the story of imperial power was arming both sides of the conflict and allowing civil war to ensue and world civil war takes place profit is made and the region is the stabilized and decisions are made for those people and you know another thing that has to be brutal is the fact that the head of the transitional council that they've set up is the former justice minister you are talking about people who literally a month ago were. in these regime are now supposedly setting up the new

democratic libya you have the saudis cut that and the u.a.e. supports him or proceed in libya and suppressing democracy in bahrain and all of those are big ships themselves now you mentioned the justice minister what about the former foreign minister minister who is as we just defected yesterday who's now in the u.k. authorities are saying is that he's not going to be immune from prosecution for his role in the lockerbie bombing but what do you think the chances are that will actually allow him to be prosecuted considering it's the british government that allowed the lockerbie bomber to go considering the reports that b.p. was lobbying at the british government to let him go in order so they can get more oil contracts in libya. well i think if there's one thing history is to with us from the a.n.c. to the taliban is that the is the friend is

a terrorist yes could be will be defined as a statesman tomorrow so really i wouldn't be surprised if he's given a place in the new government you have the new iraq has parties involved in it which the invasion would defined by the united states as terrorist groups you know this is this happens all the time so they're making a big song and dance about it will be interesting to see what happens in that regard now of course also i mean if he's if he's if he's if he's eligible to be charged with crimes surely the people that they have on this on this council that they've set up also eligible to be charged for crimes why not i mean surely david cameron who sent sniper rifles who is currently using sniper rifles to suppress the rebels that mr cameron so clearly sympathizes with isn't he eligible to be tried for some sort of crime for arming. and i think that's a fair question and we also have reports today that from the top vatican official

who is in line here their authority civilians are reported killed and of course that's what happens when you start bombing a place there are going to be gas but do you think this is just part of the collateral damage is that how they're going to treat it or does it put in that question the entire idea that we're there to protect civilians. well i think there is one important thing. david cameron in parliament was asked are the british using depleted uranium he said the british aren't using depleted uranium and they don't use depleted uranium or the people of southern iraq would probably beg to differ with that but let's just say we believe mr cameron that the british aren't using depleted uranium no one has said the united states on using depleted uranium and depleted uranium does not discriminate between somebody who is loyal to capacity and someone who is loyal to what they call the rebels so this is something that has a half life of four point five billion you so you're talking about something which

will attack the genetics of bolivian people how is that safeguarding the humanity of believe me in people i love here i thank you very much for joining us and of course now like i said the us. and your country as well now we find ourselves with this brand new war and i think it says a lot about where the priorities of our two nations lie also they're going through budget cuts right now thanks so much for joining us. thank you. earlier today secretary of defense robert gates and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff admiral mike mullen went before congress for the first time since the attack on libya they addressed lawmakers who are desperate for answers about america's latest war parties came forward was there. twelve days into the u.s. bombing of libya. u.s. congressmen were hoping to finally get some answers but after two hours of questioning the secretary of defense and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff they were still confusion about the u.s.

is ending and i think a policy success would be the removal of the qaddafi regime a military mission is a limited one and does not include regime change. who the rebels are we don't have much visibility into and of those who have risen against gadhafi each element has its own agenda. it's pretty much a pickup ball game of this point and whether the u.s. will arm them discuss our plans if you need regarding arming the rebels they seem to be getting their books weird but keep in mind pass the buck on that one deferring to the white house but if it was al qaeda decided to bristle and there are a big story would clearly have a problem about how long the u.s. will stay the bottom line is no one can predict for you how long it will take. for that to happen and whether the u.s. is at war at all these are combat operations were intended to become that are

pushed from the beginning i don't know why this administration has not been honest with the american people that this is about regime change what is clear the cost five hundred fifty million dollars in the first ten days alone and it estimated forty million dollars a month but not how it will be paid in terms of how to pay for this. there is a. we are in the discussions with the white house be very difficult for the department to eat this cost tough talk from the house over president obama's unilateral decision we don't understand what he's doing still. and i don't think he has the support of this congress when was the briefing of the armed services committee. there wasn't your circular defense you ought to be an expert on what's an act of law of war or not he told congress the president actually did not make his final decision on what to do until thursday night less than forty eight hours before the

first two hundred tomahawk missiles were fired it's mullen repeated over and over again that there would be no american ground troops there will be no american boots on the ground in libya who's the person on the ground that is directing close air support missions against his fortunes there's no one on the ground doing recent press reports at least indicate there are cia operatives on the ground so boots on the ground as i would define it and of other spending troops i guess is we'd all read about it in the newspaper at the same time i see that's my concern is that we read about things in the newspaper and then we get to come and ask the questions for us formally handed control to nato today and you know operation odyssey dawn and beginning operation unified protector but newspapers quoting vatican sources said that forty civilians were killed in coalition air strikes guaranteeing that there will be plenty of more questions for a top american military brass here in washington feeling for the artsy washington d.c. . nothing at this point seems clear about the war in libya cia operatives are on

the ground but we keep being told that there will be no boots but at the rate the information is coming out one or two weeks after the fact i have my doubts and we have to wonder if obama's own cabinet is divided and doubtful on this war on calls to arm the rebels and i want to say to congress and to the public joining me to discuss that is dr robert farley assistant professor at the university of kentucky and blogger lawyers guns and money robert thanks so much for joining us tonight now of course everyone is going crazy over this report that cia operatives perhaps a dozen of them are on the ground i don't really think that that's all that shocking i think we have to assume that they would do something of that matter but what i did find interesting is the fact that that information about this secret presidential finding came out it seems like it was deliberately leaked so do you think that there is a strategy behind that you know of bringing this information out do they think it's going to scare off the off or something. it's certainly possible i mean there there

are a lot of there are clearly some disagreements within the cabinet right now about how this should be conducted and both the war and the public. campaign inside the united states should be conducted. and what leaking the cia presence in libya does is twofold one it indicates the potential that we're serious because it looks like the libyan rebels can't really do anything on their own but it also suggests to the american people that perhaps eventually there's an endgame here somewhere on the other hand this might be someone in the administration is very unhappy with how the war is going so far even the fact that we have a war and so they similarly are trying to leak something in order to generate some sort of criticism from congress or from the media do you think that at the rate that we keep finding this information right out i mean considering the fact that obama signed this finding a couple of weeks ago i feel like we're it we're just catching up right every two weeks so can we assume the for have we do already have special off on the ground is no one's told us about it yet. it's possible in this case the not also been so

categorical that it would be very embarrassing for the administration if it came out. that we had special or spectate that the administration really wants to rely on cia for whatever reason don't count on the ground they don't wear because apparently. the british special forces. in my sexual contact with special forces been frantically one of special forces and so forth that we're relying on our intelligence services and our allies so that the administration doesn't have our special forces on the ground now when we talk about arming rebels back without me you know how long would it take to take months to take years i'm assuming that have to be some type of both on the ground in order to deliver these arms that in order to train of the rebels. this is one of those frustrating aspects of the conversation to me because despite the arming the rebels as it's always have to do this give them some entertainment and suddenly they'll be able to kill cut off tanks but in fact as you suggest. rebels have to be trained in the sort of but

there's no indication that they know what they're doing there's no indication that they know how to use these kinds of weapons in advance tactics against gadhafi forces it would take a long time even with shipments of arms to generate an effect is causing force for the rebels now secretary gates of course is in front of congress today and he said that somebody else should take on that responsibility that if the decision is made to arm the rebels some other country should do it but when you think of who would take that responsibility upon themselves. he was probably i would guess he's probably thinking in terms of either france or the united kingdom and the most of them are most enthusiastic about this particular mission he might also have been hinting that egypt might want to consider or saudi arabia might want to consider arming the rebels towards the beginning of the civil war there was the question about whether saudi arabia might shift or might ship weapons to benghazi i don't not sure that ever happened i'm not sure it didn't happen. but there might have a bit of a hint there that either the regional powers or the united kingdom or france the

age of this. the other option would be to hire some sort of private military for him and i know that a lot of people are talking about some sort of military provider for him that would do some of the training so. well let's say that they do in fact decide to hire some type of private military private contractors mercenaries whatever you want to call them and that's a decision that congress would have to sign off on right the obama administration can't just get away with rolling this out over on their own. well not necessarily a little bit in terms of actually has wide latitude in turnberry contractors i mean that even if it goes out of the administration rather than some other actor i mean we can very easily in the case of the french or the british hire a contractor to help them pick out contractors so we can certainly have influence on the process without congress being involved very much at all in how the initial training in the initial fighting goes down i'm stephanie something that congress isn't happy about and like we mentioned it does seem like there's some kind of division within the obama cabinet itself as to how to act on this situation whether

arm the rebels or not so how do you think we should look at that we did sort of good things there are some divisions that means that there's actually debate people are thinking about this or does that mean that obama's own cabinet doesn't necessarily have faith in him. i'm glad that we know about the division because i think there's always division in japanese and in small groups of people like this and so i'm glad that we have some sense of where the brown ones are being drawn if you saw the testimony today it was evident that gates robert gates was extremely happy and comfortable with this mission and i'm extremely and happy and comfortable with any sort of expansion of this mission meanwhile secretary clinton was i would call a gung ho but she was quite enthusiastic. so it is evident that something is going on some sort of disagreement with cabinet and i'm glad we know about that because it does suggest that there is some sort of conversation there about the president's being spied on a number of different viewpoints well i'm with you there i'm glad we know about it

to make me realize that i'm not the only crazy white i'm with gates here i'm comfortable with what's going on robert thanks so much for joining us thank you. now still to come on tonight's show obama finally gets his award for transparency in government and the events isn't open to the press or place on the white house schedule so tonight we're asking what's up with that and he spent nine years in get mel i never was charged with a crime so why the judge now refusing to release this feed taney discussed that after the break. you know something interesting a story and it seems so for late sleep you think you understand it and then he gives something else here's some of the part of this i realized everything is i don't know i'm sorry is a big issue. let's

not forget that we had an apartheid regime right. i think the rocket be the only one well. we never got the live shows the birds can safely get ready because of the freedom. hey guys welcome to shellings hell the alona show we've heard of are just stuff to say on the topic now i want to hear audio is going to you tube video response or to twitter for thought of the questions that we post on you tube every monday and on thursday with the show your responses during the week let your voice be heard.

when he was still running for office in two thousand and eight then senator barack obama promised the most transparent administration in history i'd like to call out the bush white house for secret meetings behind closed door dealings but since becoming president has changed quite a bit secret meetings are now just the norm if you remember back on march sixteenth the president was going to receive a transparency award yes the one that praised his commitment to an open and

transparent government he at the time the event was billed by the white house is open to a very limited press pool but it was postponed to last so i could get to the president's schedule well it turns out the bad award was presented to the president this monday and guess what the press wasn't even invited and ok i'm going to take that back there was a white house videographer and one photographer present could get this the entire event it didn't even make it on the president's public schedule that's great transparency isn't it how is that possible in the white house think that none of the groups giving the president be awarded right about the meeting now asked for transparency this white house is guilty of evoking state secrets in court hearings numerous times something of they criticize the bush white house for during the campaign they've launched a war on whistleblowers and they've been slower to respond to freedom of information act requests than other white houses before that they have that again they also start of the war without asking congress or talking to the people about it and we now know that obama signed an order weeks ago before the war even began

to allow arms to be given to the rebels and for the seat to conduct special operations so should this group have really been giving obama an award in the first place i say a big fat no they claim that this award is aspirational kind of like that nobel peace prize that obama got we all know how that played out he has created the war in afghanistan and now we're involved in yet another military conflict in libya so good luck on hopes of a more transparent white house but sorry we here on this show are not buying it. so a ruling by the d.c. circuit u.s. court of appeals could have major effects on the rights of current one time of a detainee's the court heard the case of thirty one year old who may not do all right he mohammad was not a yemeni detainee who's been held at gitmo for the past nine years his case but he's never been convicted of a crime then was captured on the afghan pakistan border back in two thousand and one and since he's been held without being accused so he filed an appeal requesting

to be released but the court of appeals determined this week that was men although there is no evidence that he was a member of the terrorist group al qaida should not be released just because he was originally found in the same location as other members of al qaeda it's just another disturbing example not only of how our laws and justice system are twisted to make up for our wrongdoings but that obama's promise of closing gitmo is nowhere near close to becoming a reality joining me to discuss this is shah had director of the bill of rights defense committee which i have thanks so much for being here tonight let's talk about this ruling although there is no evidence that the man was ever in fact involved with al qaeda just because he was in the same area and same location that means we can keep them indefinitely apparently no it's guilt by association according to the d.c. circuit it is enough to justify the indefinite detention of someone without having to prove you know you and i would expect in civilian courts guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in in the detainees context it's just

a preponderance of the evidence and it's interesting because the trial judge who did the trial found that the government's case which did amount to nothing more than guilt by association was not enough to overcome the more likely than not standard but the appeals courts and a few others i find that absolutely. incredible i have really makes me speechless but the interesting thing about with mine here too is that he is allegedly one of these fifty on triable and so you have to wonder if here's a man who is one of these untried holes right the people that are too dangerous to even bring to court and yet there is no proof that he's ever been associated with al qaeda he was just in the same area how dangerous you know you have to question how dangerous some of these things can people might really be right dick cheney said for years that all of ultimately six hundred detainees at guantanamo were the worst of the worst we've no doubt for a fact about was a bald faced lie and now the question of who did what remains i think clouded and ultimately the real danger i think here is not just one or two from on in the

future detainees who are going to have to prove themselves before. courts are increasingly inclined to bow to the executive but it's the legitimacy of the courts themselves and when courts make up a legal standards and allow cases like this to move forward it alternately undermines the legitimacy of the rulings both domestically and in this case more importantly abroad where i think the hearts and minds of our potential future fools are watching and recognizing that what america claims is the rule of law is a far cry from it well it's really interesting too because right now there is such a heated debate over whether to try some of these get no detainee's in our federal courts or in the military commissions and here we have a federal court that has made this ruling that completely twisted everything i don't understand how anyone can keep arguing for military commissions after this and yet obama just said that they're allowed to you know keep going again and they will have to start back up right one of the tropes against military commissions is this idea that civilian courts can't do the job and so here we have

a civilian court depending on how you construe it doing the job quite effectively even to furring to the executive allowing essentially an evidence let's try to convict someone with the equivalent of conviction in this case is denying the u.s. mission and the idea that the civilian courts are not up to the task i think it. it's preposterous because we see here of course doing exactly what the executive wants it to do and i have a separate criticism which is to say that it's overly inclined to defer to the executive and we need courts to check executive abuse that's what courts are for in this country at least and they're going to look at it sounds like they're up to the task of doing whatever the obama administration asked that was in order to ping as however you want to put it now you know also there of course other people aside because these tribals are going to be trying to go to court so does this just put a damper on all of it now that it's been completely loosened as to what the government can argue to keep them detained absolutely and in two different dimensions on the one hand it says guilt by association is enough if the government can really prove that someone was around people who we know to be al qaeda but

that's enough and the second is that evidence it in the face of torture will be accepted that the two people whose reports you know sort of document this persons with to guantanamo they were both tortured both of them tried to commit suicide one of them three different times and the reason courts normally don't admit evidence came through torture is because it's notoriously unreliable the d.c. circuit so it's ok here now one of the things that i found great today was marcy wheeler from firedoglake was looking at this situation that we have going on in libya right now and of course the discussion of whether or not we should arm the rebels and administration officials have all admitted that we now are we aren't quite sure right who these rebels are that there might be terrorist elements within them but we have laws against material support for terrorist organizations in this country so if this guy can get in trouble for just being in the same area and no proof of support then what is our government doing we're breaking our laws have salute you right and i think he went so far as to say that the president might be

guilty of material support for terrorism i would just note that the president has an opportunity to change the legal standard since the patriot act which extended the definition of material support this was the case that the supreme court heard last spring humanitarian law project that is up before congress again before may so the president can always the veto is will. of liability for material support. is there any doubt in your mind that guantanamo bay will not close the obama administration unfortunately i would like to see it close unfortunately i don't even know if we can leave that at the feet of the administration only because congress in some respects is tied to president's hands i was at a symposium not long ago where the white house's are for national security recommitted the administration to its pledge to close guantanamo but if i were to project forward and put on my betters i don't think it's likely that the facility will close only because we can't try to detainees here and then we go to other countries and say hey do you want to try them their response to us as well you will

take them or should we and i think that congress is really it's interesting congress in most cases is very willing like the courts to bow to the executive and allow executive abuse the one time congress has a chance to do something helpful you know they actually outflank the executive on expanding that i could have you know the one time the white house tried to give it back congress says no you have to preserve this unconstitutional crazy set up with the work of course even if progress would have allowed to transfer detainees they would have just been to illinois. solve the problem of what to do with these people thanks so much for joining us thanks for having now still to come on tonight still driving while drunk is hurting small businesses that claim from tonight's told time warner and that will return to libya to ask the question where did all the anti-war democrats. let's not forget that we are in a park right.