but can they alone to show that the real headlines with none of the mercy for me live out of washington d.c. now today marks the thirteenth day of the u.s. and nato involvement in libya and our coverage continues well called little rock or low key to give us his perspective on yet another war and on capitol hill congress held meetings on libya with admiral 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 qaida so 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 m s n b c hosts a very strong statements on the show last night which lead us to ask if the mainstream media is choosing partisanship over analysis and then could there really be a silver lining to the budget bickering 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 and 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 flashy title operation a unified protector. but this operation seems to be anything but unified with the

international community's split on whether or not to arm the rebels or how else to get gadhafi to go along the higher power 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 writer lowkey 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 or as president obama just made the decision on his own. so i think it's interesting because there was a poll. in this country about whether the public. favored action the majority good norm 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 continued civil conflict there. it would play into the interests of people who be a systems precisely. arms manufacturer profits every single day there is war in times of war they profit of course it's in the interests of people 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 a time when there are genuine revolutions ingenue in operation is happening next door in egypt and tunisia and it period presence in the country and in. 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 a still in the process of developing next to this well that's going on libya is definitely quite a difference from the the arab spring and the actual revolutions that we've seen going on you know throughout the middle east and north africa versus finding our way into it but what do you make of the idea of arming the rebels of course as a little funny to start arming rebels when it was western governments that armed it again with i feel like we see this story play out all the time. exactly you see the story of imperial powers arming both sides of a conflict and allowing civil war to ensue and world civil war takes place profit is made and the region is destabilized and decisions are made for those people and you know another thing that has to be brought up is the fact that the head of the transitional council that they've set up is the former justice minister focus you're talking about people who literally a month ago were. fees regime are now supposedly setting up the new

democratic libya you have the saudis cut the and the u.a.e. supporting democracy in libya and suppressing democracy in and all of those are big the ships themselves now you mentioned the justice minister what about the former foreign minister who just defected yesterday who's now india you can already her 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 they'll actually allow him to be prosecuted considering it's the british government that allowed the lottery bomber to go considering the reports that b.p. was lobbying the british government to let him go in order so they could get more oil contracts in libya. well i think if there's one thing history has taught us from the a.n.c. to is that the war is the friend is a terrorist yesterday will be defined as

a statesman some more 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 who so 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 since. 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. and i think that's a good question you know we also have reports today that from the top vatican

official who is in libya there are forty civilians reported killed and of course that's what happens when you start bombing a place there are going to be deaths 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 of the word there to protect civilians. well i think there is one important thing. cameron in parliament was pass 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 peg 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 aren't using completely curing him and depleted uranium has not discriminate between somebody who is loyal 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 years so you're talking about something

which will attack the genetics of the libyan people how is that safeguarding the humanity of the libyan people i look i thank you very much for joining us and of course now like i said the us england your country as well and 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. congressman 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 i think a policy success would be the removal of. the khadafi 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 at 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 but but it's in mind pass the buck on that one deferring to the white house but that was ok that side of the missile and there just we would clearly have a problem with that how long the u.s. will stay a 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 first from the

beginning i don't know why this administration is not going on this 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 discussions with the white house would 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 very few have the armed services committee. there wasn't a year certain that you ought to be an expert on what's an act of law of war or not gates 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 gates and mullen repeated over and over again 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 terrific close air support missions against gadhafi forces there's no one on the ground who 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 sending troops i guess is we'd all read about it in the newspapers the same time i see that's my concern is that we read about things in the newspaper and then we get a comment ask the questions the u.s. formally handed control to nato today and the 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 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 at all what to say to congress and to the public joining me to discuss it 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 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 lisa do you think that there is a strategy behind that you know of bringing this information out if 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 public complicity and campaign inside the united states should be conducted. and what making the cia presence in libya does this temple wanted in. syria 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 a 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 crabs we do already have special ops on the ground is no one told us about yet. if it's possible in this case the denials have been so

categorical that will be very embarrassing for the administration came out and they want to turn that we had special forces i think the administration really wants to rely on the cia for whatever reason don't count on the ground there where both apparently. the british special forces and. my sex with on exactly special forces the practical and special forces and so forth 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 but i think actually with that meet you know how long would it take could take months could it take years i'm assuming that have to be some type of boots on the ground in order to deliver these arms that in order to train of the rebel. this is one of those frustrating aspects of conversation to me because people talk about arming the rebels as this always have to do this give them some education up and suddenly they will kill cut off its tanks but in fact as you suggest. rebels have to be trained in the sort of quick

and 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 are going to get off his forces it will take a long time even with shipments of arms to generate an effective fighting 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 you know take that responsibility upon themselves. he was probably i would guess is probably thinking in terms of either france or the i think it would have been the most advanced or 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 sort of 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 know where that ever happened i'm not sure it didn't happen. but there might have been a bit of hint there that either the regional powers or the united kingdom or

a friend. had this. the other option would be to hire some sort of private military for him and i know that a lot of it we're talking about some sort of military provider for him that would do some of the training so. that 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 one over on their own. well not necessarily are really the admin that actually has wide latitude in her and very contractors not even if it goes out of the administration rather than some other actor i mean we can very easily indicate to the french or the british that they can hire a contractor to help them pick out a contractor so we can certainly have influence on the process without congress being involved very much at all how the training and the eventual fighting goes down of definite 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 i mean is that a good thing that there are some divisions i mean 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. and i'm glad that we know about the division because i think there's always division in cabinets 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 probably to some of the extreme we are now feeling comfortable with this mission i'm extremely and have been a couple and it's sort of expansion of the station meanwhile secretary clinton was i would call a gun toter 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 on there about the president's things upon a number of different viewpoints well i'm with you there i'm glad we know about it

too makes me realize that i'm not the only crazy one 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 but the event isn't open to the press or placed on the white house schedule so tonight we're asking what's up with that and he spent nine years and get no i never was charged with a crime so why is the judge now refusing to release this detainee what has caused that after the break. you know sometimes you see a story that seems so poorly sleep you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here's some other part of it and realized everything you saw you don't uncharged is a big picture. let's

not forget that we had an apartheid regime right. i think. the the one well. we never got the show's there to keep him safe get ready because of the freedom. you guys welcome to shellings hell on the on a show which part of our guests have to say on the topic now i want to hear our audience just go on to you tube the video response or the twitter profile of the questions that we've posted on you tube every monday and on thursday with the show your responses please 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 had changed quite a bit secret meetings are now just the norm but 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 the at the time the event was billed by the white house is open to a very limited press pool but was postponed the last second due 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 request than other white house has before that and then 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 across the board 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 a major effect on the rights of current one time of a detainee's the court heard the case of thirty one year old who've been abdulrahim muhammad with not a yemeni detainee who's been helping him over the past nine years his case that he's never been convicted of a crime when 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 to try executive director of the bill of rights defense committee 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 him 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 that you and i would expect in civilian courts guilt beyond

a reasonable doubt 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 amounts of nothing more than built by association was not enough to overcome the more likely than not standard but the appeals courts and a few others but i find that absolutely. incredible had really makes me speechless but the interesting thing about with nine hundred two is that he is allegedly one of these fifty on trials and so you have to wonder if here's a man who is one of these i'm tribals 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 out how to be just in the same area how dangerous you know you have to question how dangerous some of these fifteen people might really be right dick cheney said for years that all of. the six hundred detainees at guantanamo were the worst of the worst where we didn't go down for a fact that that 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 the harm to the small in the

future detainees who are going to have to prove themselves before. courts that are increasingly inclined to proud of the executive but it's the legitimacy of the courts themselves you know 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 flows are watching and recognizing that what america claims is the rule of law is a far cry from it what's really interesting too because right now there is such a heated debate over whether to try some of these to go 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 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 you know deferring to the executive allowing essentially in evidence was trying to convict someone with the equivalent of conviction in this case is denying maybe it's protection and the idea that the civilian courts are not up to the task i think it. is 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 get it sounds like they're up to the task of doing whatever the obama administration asked that was your tipping as however you want to put it now you know also there are of course other people inside because he's taking on trials that 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 him 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 is needed in the face of torture will be accepted that the two people whose reports you know the sort of document this person is with them to guantanamo they were both torture both of them tried to commit suicide one of them three different times and the reason courts normally don't admit i've been skiing through torture is because it's notoriously unreliable well 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 the 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 who these rebels are that there might in fact 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 no proof of support then what is our government doing we're breaking our own lot of so we 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 me so the president could always a veto his will. out of liability for material support. is there any doubt in your mind that i'm not able not close to the obama administration unfortunately i would like to see a close unfortunately i don't even know if we can leave it at the feet of the administration only because congress in some respects is tied to presidents hands i was at a symposium not long ago where the white house and so 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 try to do scenes here and we go to other countries and say hey do you want to try them their response to us as well you will take them

why should we and i think the 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 power you know the one time the white house tried to give it back congress says no you have to put this unconstitutional crazy stuff with or course even of congress would have allowed him to transfer the detainees they would have just been to illinois as well when he solved the problem of what to do with these people now so i thank so much for joining us thanks for having me and i saw you come on tonight still driving while drunk is hurting small businesses that's the claim from tonight's told time warner and then we'll return to libya to ask the question where did all the anti-war democrats get from. you know sometimes you see a story and see so. you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here so you saw the part of it.