c.d.o. for your media to. review john karr tetons tom. you want to say blair mountain which i agree with. that may get. caught in the middle in a battle for blair mountain corporations versus miners miners versus environmentalists and even miners against each other so who will come out victorious and appalachian what does it say about corporate power and mean for the country. and the corporations well they're obama's fix for america's job problem yes the same corporations that ship us jobs overseas so is america's economic system still adequate to solve the problem or does the answer later perhaps in

foreign investment. by. an early release for the coc seen here shooting and killing oscar grant back in two thousand and nine two after serving less than a year of the sentence are police getting away with murder we'll speak with oscar grant's uncle. good afternoon it's monday june thirteenth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm lauren lyster and you're watching our team now ninety years ago coal miners rose up in the largest armed insurrection since the civil war it became known as the battle of blair mountain some credit it with launching the labor movement and creating the middle class america that exists today but that battle is not over some of those coal miners descendants along with activists and environmental. march

this last week and what's being called the second battle of blair mountain are his own tale and ford was there and here's the story. in the mountain west virginia a battle is raging. for the state every man to its core its job. and the soul of resistance in appalachians the same. let's see. how did miners activists environmentalists marched up blair mountain to demand an end to mountaintop removal. technique that blast rock to get it call seems within which environmentalist say said the free reading town causing flooding and contaminating rivers water going through water they retrace the steps of more than ten thousand coal miners who in one thousand twenty one took up arms for the right to unionize and survive to fifteen thousand coal miners forming an army and marching up the mountain that's right behind me you know and fighting you know

against an army paid for by a coal operators jack keane his great grandfather led the charge is the president of the west virginia miners union but it's a history he didn't from texas this is a history that has been concealed from west virginians the only time you see the word union in the book is when they use union carbide the chemical company my great grandfather my grandfather my father bob schultz worked in the mines for thirty seven years oh my god that's what we need is how to say. i got a phone call the very same call that gave him black lung making breathing and working difficult every doctor. he's sleeping to agree i can't work i have an iraq war. mr schultz is not able to work. here. say it's not because a black guy his wife debbie says he's paid with his help for. that you can do what

he wants. he wants to go like a prisoner and found a home perhaps family fought alongside checks in the minors war but bob won't be marching they want to save blair mountain which i agree with. but they want to stop me and my friends and my family from mining and that's how we make early in the. cold for chile the only living to be made in logan county ninety years. from the worst prescription drug abuse in america that's all there is called if you're not in a call you're into the drugs it's one or the other for. nearly a century later at the core companies still wield incredible influence and political power. marchers found public roads blocked boulders and campsites shut down the coal companies call them up and said if you let these marcher stay at your campsite everybody in your family is going to lose their job

which side are you. which side are you. are you. more than one hundred forty protesters trespassed and coal company land like the miners are called the corps companies before their ninety years ago these activists say they intentionally wrists arrest by trespassing on the mines property to draw attention to the second battle of blair mountain and they say the resistance is an ending anytime soon and appalachians will rise again a more so angry that. the people you know the people of appalachia the hillbillies have been beaten down for so long and been you know. been held under the boot heel of the coal industry for so long where mounting for both sides its everything its resources its coal its history and its symbol its part of appalachian it's a battle that neither side is willing to surrender for r.t. blair west virginia. the second battle of blair mountain deals with protesters

panem against corporate interests and what activists call her if it were king conditions and the mountaintop removal mining techniques in the area that have allegedly polluted the water and cause health problems and even death now this case affects local residents but here to put these issues in context in the united states is labor journalist michael has covered a number of these stories also has deep roots in the labor struggle movement i would say that you think that's fair my question to you in that case you have miners pitted against corporate interests and of course the issue of corporations putting profits before people of profits before safety this is just one case but i'm curious of how representative you think it is of the modern day struggle in the labor movement in this country and you know certainly you know being there was a study that came out last week that showed that union mines are received than up fifty percent cheaper than nonunion mines and in these situations constantly it's

about safety it's also about providing for somebody's situation and unions really provide a voice for people to express themselves on the job and this is what's really at stake moments some from what i understand there are there are union mines in blair mountain where there's so many union mines and blue mountain i mean there are throughout which region of the mountaintop mining you know there's very few you know it's part of the reason why coal companies should determine the type you know mining was so that they didn't have to deal with it. and i'm just curious you know bigger picture because you have covered a number one of these a number of these labor struggled if you see this you know because i think people could see this story and say ok this is you know this effect just these people that are there are struggling against this one company is that the case is that just you know these miners struggling against one corporation or do you see this as been balik of labor struggles that are going on against corporations all over this country and i think what is happening in appalachia is really the canary in the coal mine of what is happening with corporate power across. united states

corporations can come to just about any community use it up often as they do cool communities mythical runs out they've been in the town the town goes poor it's not already poor and then just abandon it and i think this is really symbolism and blair mountain being a say with the united states government on the union protesters on them with airplanes is a symbol it's a sacred symbol for the lieberman the fact that they going to destroy it is unheard of i mean this is like destroying bunker or destroying gettysburg for the leader of this is an absolute crime against history well one of the things that the got to me is that in march of two thousand i'm blair mountain was placed on the national register of historic places but then reportedly call operator pressure on state agencies cause them to change that and to get rid of that delist at nine months later making it easier for coal companies to mine there i'm curious if you're surprised that coal operators influence the state and why you think there was a change of course and what you think it does about the relationship between industry and doesn't and policy you know cooperators and appalachia of often behave

like the role of dictators you know they own the government there's no other industry in town take for instance what happened call river mountain there's color of a mountain west virginia is an area where they could put up a lot of when mills a lot of wind farms the coal industry want to go out even though they're not going to mine that mountain coal river for coal they not won't allow that mt talk to be used for when front because they don't want to be anything else in this is emblematic of the power that coal companies have throughout the state of us regina why do they have so much power and is this just coal companies or do you see this as a trend of corporate power over politics in this country i think is a trend of corporate power throughout this country to call companies discussion which would you know i think with a worse situation for instance it was a big case a few years ago about non tuckerman mining before the last west virginia state supreme court so before the case just to make sure that you know the mine company would get it when the court case the c.e.o. of massey energy don blankenship went on up. vacation in the french riviera with

the state supreme court chief justice i mean and you know on top of being one of his biggest campaign planners this is how they've always done this was watching what it meant more broadly i know you and i have both covered the labor struggle in illinois at the honeywell uranium plant and that's a situation where we know that c.e.o. is a major or at that company is a major donor to politics and it has you can argue influence in politics i just want to know if you see this as. as corporations kind of broadly winning out over the rights of workers in this country i think the broadly winning but i think you know even look at what's happening with the people getting arrested in blair mountain people resisting people going to continue to resist and that's something that's very tough to get rid of so that in times of corporations of trans workers many times in this country we did the first battled with one of the lesson of blair mountain is that you can't cover liberal that people remember fights and people rise up again but on the flip side you know in that story i think it points out kind of the complexity of these struggles you have

a miner who has black lungs he can't work anymore he's very ill at the same time he said hey no way am i going to go march against these coal companies these are the only jobs in this region if i march against them there goes my job there goes my friends job it is better to have a job and suffer then to have no job i don't think this is a zero sum situation we can create different types of jobs in our kolaches but you can create you know when forms you can create manufacturing you can do all types of pleasure and history because of the not very good jobs if you look at anywhere where there's coal mining you see the highest levels of poverty and you in the united states and that's for a reason and coal companies have always kept out other industries because nobody wants to really work in coal nobody must work in the dangerous conditions nobody wants to get back on and so coal companies have been able to keep this out and they've been able to put miners against community members that prefer something better because miners don't the way we as a country have to present another way if we ever want to move past the problems school. so upon whom do you place the burden of this situation do you blame the

corporations for these practices do you blame the government for not regulating it in the way that it needs to in order to have workers have living wages and have on the conditions and order to work or do you blame you know the public for not understanding these things or unions are not maybe representing the best interests of their workers all the time i think i think you have to blame corporations and unions both for the problem not open for you know the united mine workers has never spoken up against it and it's impoverished appalachia. corporations have pushed it so i think that both need to be blamed and i think we as a general public we tend to ignore at the lodge we tend to look a bit of trash or some type of other and i think really we need to have a broad discussion about appalachia because we can't heal the problems of clean energy until we heal the the wounds of appalachia that's been caused by coal mining what about more broadly who do you blame in what you say is kind of the struggle of of corporations versus labor and corporate power in this country well i think more

broadly it's the government which have not created conditions in which people can organize well and which people can have access to the vote inclusion and the fact that i supreme court elections in the state of this region the highest bidder to put in millions of dollars i'm going to mountain on it is a big issue and i think something that you know we all share a certain amount of blame with and you know we need to be more vigilant and i think what's happening in blair mountain is really a wake up call for the rest of the country well i want to thank you so much for putting it in context with your reporting that you've done that was labor journalist mike. now u.s. president barack obama for one is relying on u.s. corporations for solutions to dis countries jobs problem now he met with his jobs council today for a plan to discuss it and this council is made up of c.e.o.'s from big corporations and it's headed by general electric's jeffrey immelt here's what here's a little on them. but these are leaders who have

a decades of experience in running some of america's best businesses creating jobs understanding what it takes to grow our economy and strength of our middle class now meanwhile activists such as the hacker group anonymous see a totally different solution to the country's economic woes they do not see corporations as the solution they see civil disobedience and resistance as the solution they're calling to get rid of the corporate and big bank influence over the economy and politics and fact and yet another solution we're seeing being blazed by the state of idaho they're looking for help from the chinese from chinese companies to invest in their states projects now here to help us all break it down is author and journalist david cross thanks so much for being with us now i know tomorrow several groups are launching a nonviolent protest movement protesting the economy and campaign finance influence and in too big to fail of breaking up the fed ordering ben bernanke you

to step down one of those groups is the hacker group anonymous and they actually released this video targeting ben bernanke i just want to show a little bit of that and take a look at this excerpt you have for degree of confidence in your ability to control this one percent. one percent. to go. with good companies where they show up for the rumors are true mr berman. large the record of. the federal reserve schuster should we leave the country to me for one percent of the population. now david i know you support this larger resistance plan tomorrow i know there's a protest planned around the country i'm curious what exactly is going to happen tomorrow and what are you calling for. the war started a movement some are as you said the nonviolent movement with two primary objectives

and they are object was that anonymous is touched on previous videos as well they are that and the system of political bribery which is campaign finance lobbying and the revolving door and the other main objective is to break up the federal reserve and the two big to fail banks you know if you are one of the ninety nine percent of americans you have a core common sense goal to achieve two goals but what are we actually going to see tomorrow are we going to see large scale demonstrations are we going to see people there i don't know i don't or you know what's going to happen is anonymous going to hack the federal reserve but that's a plan here well as an essential us move and i don't know exactly what's going to happen but what i do know is going to happen and there's going to be protests in twenty three different cities is also going to be people taking individual actions we're going to be removing that money from the big banks you know whatever

individual actions can be taking along with these proposals of protests from twenty three cities tomorrow at eleven am i will be at one chase the we're going to round up some people and then by one o'clock we're going to head to liberty park which is now called the car park down in the financial district and people we occupy in that park indefinitely and so the man's arm back as far as campaign finance lobbying and then the federal reserve and it's too big. of a now so we'll have to see how long that was how long that stakeout last may we can talk you out there campaigning but my question for you this is obviously a very different approach to solving the problems of this country than what we see and washington and the approach that we see president obama called for he for one that was his. jobs and competitiveness council which he has touted to promote job

creation but it's made up of twenty six private sector leaders headed by c.e.o. of general electric so implied in this council is that you know by touting private sector corporate leaders to solve the job problem is that corporate interests are aligned with the best interests of workers and unemployment in this irks me and employment rather in this country do you agree or disagree with that. willow i completely disagree and you know if you look at the objective really the answers the one of the one percent of the u.s. population has not goes well for ninety nine percent of the delays and i mean if you look at the leaders that they've been or who are in jobs or short millions of jobs you know the inequality of all time high as forty four million people on food stamps a record breaking numbers of people living in poverty i mean the statistics for themselves i mean we're at a point now where the democrats and the republicans have been bored or like

campaign gone and the revolving door and lobbying and unless we step forward and start doing this nonviolent civil disobedience politicians are not going to represent us as they have been doing we see where being. so or ok. so you see action as kind of the antidote to the money that we deploying into washington from big corporations and that sort of thing that's your solution i want to show g.e.'s emmel solution he wrote a at a tauriel in the wall street journal today i just want to show the data point of what this can be a calling for to create a million jobs quickly one is to train workers for today to open jobs another is to streamline permitting to facilitate small business loans to construction workers back to work fighting the two million who don't have jobs in this country so those are some of the solutions that they go into boost jobs and travel and tourism so those are those solutions that the jobs commission is calling for that the jobs are

is calling for but i want to call attention for a minute to immelt the record as c.e.o. at g.e. and their record of job creation so let's bring up that chart or graphic i have those fins and all became c.e.o. of g.e. the company had actually shed thousands of u.s. jobs but the corning to their annual report and it become more reliant at the same time on foreign workers day you can see right there and i'm sorry david you can't see that but i'll try to pare. at the end of two thousand there were one hundred sixty eight thousand u.s. workers for g.e. and that was about fifty four percent of their workers and then it go to two thousand and ten the beginning of that year one hundred thirty four thousand workers in the u.s. and it dropped down to forty four percent of their workers so my question to you i have a feeling i know we're going to say but i want your analysis you know should someone like him out who's been touted by the administration to create jobs be walking the walk and does this show that he's not and that corporations don't really have the will to implement maybe some of the policies they're calling for. you know these

policies they all sound nice and the sound like they're going to do good things but look at their track record as you stated it's piracy you know offshoring jobs g any taxes i mean that was all about you know sacrifice you know our population. will have a dollar in fact i mean this you know. this is just absurd i mean how long are we going to keep rolling for their propaganda and then i saw and remain to do well the future is literally going up in flames economically i think the question and i want to just point to a little bit more of g.e.'s track record and the track record of these corporations on obama's council because you mentioned offshoring you mentioned the g.e. has not paid taxes i think they paid zero for their corporate taxes this year a lot of have to do with tax havens with foreign investment we're taking our investments and investing in other countries and in fact if we can bring up this graphic showing g.e.'s foreign investment there reinvestment abroad is jump from

forty seven billion dollars in two thousand and six to ninety four billion dollars in two thousand and ten that is according to their disclosure filings and according to bloomberg study a lot of the corporations that are represented on this jobs commission represent similar trends their brand best that are brought in an increase and i'm curious with you does this kind of underscore the difference between corporate interests and national interests i think what the american people are really starting to understand is that these are global corporations they have no loyalty to the american public you know those charges show their best the money in emerging markets and they are concerned globally they are a little concerned with the american middle class they see the american middle class as an obstacle to further profits. record breaking profits record breaking in and so my question to you corporations are always going to be beholden to their shareholders to profit that is how. they operate but

a popular view in the us is that the economy is spurred by private sector job growth that the private sector is who needs to get this going so my question is is the current economic system adequate to deal with today's challenges in the u.s. not a not for the larger population no it's out which were small percentage of the drop was ok and really quickly could the solution be and having other countries invest in the u.s. we see idaho and our governor kind of blazing the trail asking chinese companies to come and invest in their projects there we see chinese companies being interested in a few different projects fertilizer plants technology zone they're actually building some solar panels there five hundred people employed to do that traditionally we've seen a lot of resistance in the us to allowing chinese companies to buy american companies do you think that we should be alarmed in the us at this or do you think that this is the solution. is part of the solution i mean i see this is you know you know

well the centralised economic forces that are growing going to war so what we need to do is essentially was going back to the local low and you know as you said the banks not. local level essentially was the economic solutions that's the way we have to go so don't fear china bring em in have on by companies that was author and journalist david de graw with that analysis thanks so much. now maybe you remember the case of oscar grant he is was a twenty two year old unarmed man who was shot and killed by a police officer on new year's day back in two thousand and nine while he was laying face down in oakland train station well it's igniting protests now take a look. through. your. work right. now protests yesterday that you're seeing there protests continuing today because he was found guilty on the charge of involuntary manslaughter in grant's death was released so that is why you

are seeing this reaction this was after serving just eleven months of his two year sentence now the officer you may recall he admitted to shooting grant but he said that he thought it was his taser gun he was using and he was actually convicted of a lesser offense then a second degree murder the prosecutors were seeking it ignited protests back at that time when that sentence was handed down activists say they see this is a message to people of color that their lives don't mean anything the cop in this case was white grant was an african-american and also they're reportedly protesting because they think that the criminal justice system gives lenient treatment to police officers as well who shoot and kill young black men now see this johnson he is the uncle of oscar grant and he joins us now in our l.a. studio i want to thank you so much for being here first of course you know how do you feel now that this officer has been released has justice been served and the case of oscar grant no justice have not been served and.

you don't know what is important here is the a mother has lost a dear son. daughter has lost a father. and her fiance has lost a home. and yet we have heard of family destroyed. because johannes lee claims that he meant to put his taser instead of his weapon it is obvious. and people of color that that was not an accident that was intentional and he has not been held accountable for that and now i want to ask you know in kind of touched on this a little bit but i know a lot of activists see this not as just about the case of oscar grant but as a testament to the state of race relations and also criminal justice and justice in the case of police violence in this country i'm just curious how you

being a family member see this is this about broader injustice then than just your your nephew and what is that broader injustice it is much broader than just you know he brought light and has woken up the consciousness of the people in the community to begin to really speak to this issue says one nine hundred seventy six to two thousand over two hundred seventy nine black and burn brown men have been killed by police officers prior to mostly only six that actually been brought to trial truck . one found guilty. for murder and that was. the office that i killed maleness green in detroit that officer didn't receive any time now with mentally he was found guilty on the gun charge as well as involuntary manslaughter we don't accept the most

a lot of charge or verdict but gun in housman we know would bring our prison term so there was some accountability and some form of justice that we felt when a jury came back with that bird it would judge robert perry the same just i was over to wrap our case again did it and show just how races this criminal criminal justice system is he took that verdict that the jury came back with and decided that he was troubled by it and overturned it thereby reduce an r. verdict to just involuntary manslaughter granted him the song call right to give him a two year sentence good time sir to serve less than eleven months just for context you find out the number. of men that were killed by police officers that ten thousand five hundred seventy eight do you know how that compares to. people killed by police officers or. any other racial i don't know exactly how that compares but

i do know that there's an extreme major difference. and many of those young black and brown men kill had been killed by officers where they allege that they either felt that their lives were in danger or the individual happened to be reaching for a weapon and this is repeatedly go ahead as miserably claimed that night he shot oscar in the bag that oscar was reaching for a gun and he kept this story for a week and then somehow some way decided to change the story to he was reaching for his taser so that he goes to show the extreme. angry just hanging is an act that these police officers commit when it comes to african-american young men when they want to use the justification that they're reaching for a weapon aka did not have a weapon on him nor was the reach of for a weapon and that the prize looked on his face had more to do with the fact that osgood didn't have a gun.