well the debt war continues to rage here in washington with d.-day whether for default or ratings downgrade closer and closer on the rising but is this really an economic crisis or a political ploy or as some have said to bring down a president. but we've always going to be the yeah the feel because he's always going to be a big fellow well a convicted felon he may be but after serving a decade on death row cory may is finally a free man police lot reads the death penalty racism and the drug war all factor into this tragic story an exclusive report in just

a bit. to see around the world cases. now rape murder and we see there are there cases in which there's actually been will best occasional prosecution and it's crimes like these that are on the fence contractors a bad name and your business couldn't be better for mercenary forces what's behind all this and what does it mean for america's countless wars. to evening it's wednesday july twenty seventh i'm lisa caputo here in washington d.c. and of course they are watching our t.v. and we begin today with what else about our ongoing international crisis now less than one week folks in fact by these six hours and counting that's how much time is left until the end of the world's terrifying august second apocalyptic deadline which keep in mind we've already moved three times now and so despite the fact that

raising the arbitrary and it is arbitrary debt ceiling is something that we've done like clockwork more than a hundred times and facts and seven hundred forty two political parties seem to think that it's fine to sit there and argue and not reach a deal but body i mean why can't these guys just get it together and do what they're hired to do legislate well see answer the question that i posed to legendary investor jim rogers take a listen to what he had to say. may i suggest you stop watching i know you have to report something because you're on t.v. but it's a charade it's the spanish the scale they're not going to do anything serious they going to go announce something the day before the day but the day after and they're going to say everything is ok but in six months from now or year from now america's going to be in worse shape than it is now they're going to continue to spin and drive assad deeper into we've been doing this for forty years this is not going to go anywhere that jim to just bolster your point of fact we saw white house officials on thursday evening calling all the top bankers essentially saying guys

don't worry there's not going to an actual default even if the debt tackett cap isn't raised so that begs the question what's the point what's the point of the charade what's the point of the you know working people i mean i'm glad i got something to cover here as a journalist but come on. trying to get publicity for themselves or posturing that's what politicians do let's see the studies show that people are good politicians so the people who are good at playground when they were in grammar school and these guys are a playground yet again only it's with our money and is driving america deeper and america's the largest debtor nation in the history of the world it's just getting worse we had something called the grace commission twenty five or thirty years ago and said we got to stop it and then they passed the law congress the gramm rudman laws and we're no more deficit spending they've also got mad and ignore that we've been doing this annually for decades no one of them well it seems like not only do they have to behavior of toddlers but there certainly seem to have the memory of

toddlers but jim to go back to something you said earlier i mean when you say that even if we do reach this deal everything looks great for a little while but six months to a year gets worse what do you mean when you say gets worse i mean if you didn't talk about these abstract terms but if you look at the facts fourteen point one million americans unemployed over half of all american families live from paycheck to faith paycheck more than forty four million are. food stamps i mean what set a look like for those of us who can't lose a thing for we're all going to continue to get deeper and deeper into debt that we see they've been spending a lot of money and the people who've been receiving that money think they're better off and they probably are they've got more money in their pocket but the overall situation lucy is getting more and more serious america is now the largest debtor nation in the history of the world this cannot go on forever yes then surely the creditors are going to say listen no more that's the end of the line you think the problems are bad now you wait so we don't have any more credit you wait

a little bit currencies collapsing you wait till interest rates are going through the roof and inflation is going through the roof it's not going to be a pretty picture the going to be social unrest is going to be a mess but we better deal with the sooner we deal with it the better if we can deal with it now or last year or even this year we might have a hope abscess some periods of very very painful periods then we can start over but as you said jim you've been around a long time and they've been talking about the for a long time and said they're not going to they're not going to take the massive kind of cuts that they need to take to the spending in order to get the situation under control so i mean what's the future going to look like are we going to go back to agrarian economy i mean i thought of it she teaching my kids science and chinese is going to be firewood and fields plowing well i'm glad you've been attentive lucy because i'm going to be that way in one hundred eighteen the u.k. was the richest most powerful country in the world but in three decades they were bankrupt and they were bailed out by the i.m.f. it was not a pretty sight in the u.k. three generations later had

a lost decade in america because we refused to deal with reality prepare yourself for another lost decade or more depending on how bad things got down there that you might want to ask you a little more personal question i know you've talked about the so while you know in some ways are sort of the the all-american golden boy you know you were born next door to us here in maryland bred in alabama that you're doing now in singapore are things that back here. you last but no i'm filled american citizen no american voter an american taxpayer but lucy the twenty first century is going to be the century of asia whether we like it or not i've got two little children want them to grow up speaking mandarin and i want them to know asia make the best skills that i can give them for their lifetimes mandarin and asia so common parents do a lot of things with their children some people move near sports cancer near other schools we move here so our children can can grow up speaking mandarin and knowing asia let me ask a minute if you think say that things are so bad here and are politicians certainly

can't seem to get their act together why not renounce your citizenship why not wash your hands of the whole economic mess and move on but i haven't done that i get i will go and consider that if that's going to pass your suggestion but i. don't see doing that it is time soon well if so then i think maybe not that bad we have a chance of turning the whole not around but i don't see any chance of our turning it around we will have rallies certainly along the way but unfortunately i don't see countries that have gotten themselves into this situation lucy never do anything until there's a crisis or a semi crisis when we have our crisis or our semi crisis on io but years away but it's probably not then maybe we will start taking some serious action or the market will force us to take seriously this isn't this what we're seeing right now that's not a crisis fourteen point one million unemployed after the four million food stamps that's not that's not even the tip of the iceberg. lou see the new york stock exchange the dow jones industrial average is near its all time i what kind of price

this is that when the financial markets are all fat and happy and most people well i hope i mean yes there are people that are better despondent and suffering right now because it's not a crisis way to lose a crisis look around the world look at what happened in iceland because some of the other serious crises we've had in the past three or four years then you will understand what the word crisis means and there you have it legendary investor jim rogers predicting no armageddon in august but the long term lots to worry about there. all right one thing on the economy what else could we possibly talk about today i want to focus on why it is that we've gotten to this absurd point i mean the past few weeks of brought us shouting matches on t.v. that's for sure and let's press conferences so called economic plans that don't seem to be worth the political paper that they're printed on what we have to show for it all trench warfare between the two parties with folks like you an idea american people caught in the crossfire now i'm surprised frankly that congressman she had as high an approval rating as six percent i mean if it was me i'd send all

those guys home fire them and get some people who could actually do the job that they're paid and hired and voted to do regardless of whether we see a default or a partial default or even some sort of a spending cuts deal cuts will be made and there will be pain and i'll take my word for it that's according to richard wolffe is an economist and the author of capitalism hits the fan the global economic meltdown and what to do about it and he joined me earlier today i think we have that interview is that we have it. if the government cannot raise the debt ceiling all that it means is that the government cannot borrow the money that it had intended to borrow to do the spending that both parties voted into office last year and so the government will have less money than an anticipated because it can't borrow and so it'll have to make cutbacks it is very clear that it will not cut back on interest payments to creditors so there's not question of

a default on the united states cannot afford and will not what it will do if it still doesn't get an agreement by august second is start spending less money and so the pain will be fanned the felt by whoever they spend less on they could cut back on war expenditures that would hurt defense contractors they could back cut back on all kinds of purchases you know the united states government is one of the largest purchasers of many commodities in the world and if they cut back in those areas or if they give less money to states and cities they will suffer so it's a question of how the government will cut back if they can't borrow the money they were supposed to be able to borrow when everybody passed this year's budget during the good debates last year and let's be realistic i richard i mean you've been watching our washington and the economy for a long time really fence mending in actual genuine cuts there. well if this continues if they really don't have the money they're not going to have much choice if they don't make defense cuts what are they going to do cripple the states and

cities who need desperately the financial aid they get from the federal government since they are already facing austerity cutbacks are they going to say no no to old people about their social security checks they're going to be in an increasingly difficult spot which is why so many people including me imagine that if they don't reach agreement by august second they will by august fourth or ninth or something because it's too much political pressure not to do it and this is a political struggle as you said yourself these are two parties positioning themselves for a presidential election next year trying to create an image getting lots and lots of publicity from you folks that they don't have to pay for and that's exciting for them and if that means that it damages some people for a while it screws up the economy it damages the reputation of the united states globally well that's not for them such a big problem they have a political project and that's what they're going to pursue it better seems

illogical to me that yeah yeah i understand washington is ruled by politics that this isn't this is a game that we're playing and this is the united states of america i mean what if there isn't any country to the fairly be elected into office for i mean if you bring this to the brink of the end how could you possibly win i've got hers really going to fall for that argument. well i think you know if you take a page from history the great empires of the past collapsed most of the time and because their own leadership got cocky with their notion of being forever in that position didn't work out their disagreements didn't take the prudent course of action and there's no reason to believe that the american political system is in mulan to what has brought a lot so many other empires and i think what you're seeing now is a an economic crisis that hit in two thousand and seven this country cannot get out

of that crisis for the mass of people and you are now seeing the effects of an unresolved economic crisis wobbling up into the political structure and hamstringing it from being able to deal with this society i do think for me and for many observers around the world you're looking at the united states which was the central center of world capitalism for fifty years since the second world war demonstrating to the people a level of inability to solve its economic problems now being come pounded by an inability to function politically and that has enormous ramifications for a system that thought it could always look at the united states as the key sovereign. under control leader of the pack and it can't do that anymore and crumbling not only for economic reasons but as you say for politics now i want to prayer as a sound bite or something bill maher said. yesterday evening take

a listen. i think a lot of republicans do want to see a calamity this is what will bring down the obama presidency you know they didn't have a clinton there in obama there was no scandal he has nothing that they could launch a crusade about this is it this is what they're launching their crusade about to forever destroy his presidency couldn't really be that called hearted and political politically calculated. well i wouldn't put it quite the way bill maher did but i see his point basically i think it's a larger process than anything the republicans invented or that they could control and you have a united states that is suddenly discovering and i'm talking here about a mass of working people that the american dream that they had expected to be there that they had expected to be able to pass to their children is more and more out of reach they can't get the wages that would it pay for it they can no longer borrow

to get it that way it's slipping away they're shocked they're upset no one prepared them for this there's no end in sight of this constriction of their opportunities and they're upset and they're looking around for some one to blame for something to explain this the republicans have an answer it's the evil government i don't think it makes any sense i don't think it holds water but it is something at a time when nobody else in the society seems to have a clue and the republican see it and they feel it and they're running with that board of all the government is the problem and obama in particular because he's the head of the government now and they're going to ride that as far as they can go and it seems to be working to some extent he has a forty three percent job approval rating for the week of july eighteenth or twenty fourth one of the lowest weekly ratings of a very very briefly if this is all about politics there's into the democrats the

republicans even need to take that much action to get obama here i mean jeffrey immelt obama's on jobs are just. g.'s exporting all these high tech x. ray jobs to china doesn't seem like a body of a lot of help to get in trouble here no i think that you take a page from obama's own history. people brainy george bush for the collapse and that help obama wins it is not surprising that the republicans would now like to play the same game on mr obama blaming him for everything and hoping that in the collapse that follows they wind power and then they will be once again where george bush was it's a political system in which the two sides juggle for power but nobody attends to the underlying economic issues while at the end of the day it's folks like you and i unfortunately for expat pay the price there richard thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us. that's not that often not often enough at least that we

can bring you a story with a happy ending here on our t.v. and the story that you're about to see is an incredible one that you really must pay attention to it's a piece that encompasses justice race class the real face of america's war on drugs in the deep south the story of a man who spent nearly a decade behind bars before being finally been indicated free from death row for defending his infant daughter and his home parties killing four takes us to mississippi where all unfolded. it's a day corey may has waited nearly a decade. the day he could wrap his arms around his kids. i mean with long time ago this would have been well. we don't have to see behind it was like say we're going to take. a little. bit of that should be with you and eat his mother's cooking. it was great could only dream from his cell death row

. bump than to the old chair with a roll after probably already. this but in his character it really took the fall a real. deal. but i always say on my will one day. he was coming home cory story begins here on december twenty sixth two thousand and one with police executed a warrant against jamie smith before proceeding to his side of the duplex what happened next would change corey's life forever corey says he was asleep when police broke down the door looking for drugs pain meds in the someone you know this is actually a half year old son will break into your house when the little girl. is trying to defending his eighteen month old daughter corey says he hid behind her back and fired three shots killing prince is clear. sophos or ron jones he was

a white troll one whose dad was white. teeth police that's the fact that corey is black he's charged with feeling right police done enough marijuana for a one hundred dollars fine because he was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in just two hours by a jury of ten whites in two black actors want to do nothing in this into the truth like the truth will go save me from this. i. never would have thought they would do what they'd done to. take me away to. make me like this it wasn't that. they had to do this there's no malice and never would have the weren't for the raid was based entirely on a tip from this quote reliable police informant. who are very

very very. you. don't. know. that this interview does he stay with well even that race the story because it became very valuable in the pursuit of this so you still corey spent nine and a half years in prison three on death row before he won his appeal and eventually his freedom when his mother came to me cory happens to be the same age as the sloan i went to get it. and i couldn't help but think you know that i could be rational for defending corey pavin says he was fired as princes public defender today corey is among friends and family who are. about smile and an update they had against them because this is nature he's been my daily receives the smalltown he were always smiling and open to you he came home.

just so you know. still haven't said it isn't safe for corey and jefferson davis county always always going to be the yeah that you know because. even though we have certainly proven that there was no wind keen on his part do you need any of it he's always going to be dead yeah he's always going to be a big fellow now thirty cory's eager to get on with his life or go to flaws this. isn't we're see we're. probably seven. confident that it was the truth that set him free. word our t. monticello this is it. now the troops may be coming home or at least promised to be coming home but it seems that defense contractors are poised to keep on shipping out all in the name of fighting america's many wars abroad of course despite the controversy the murders the lawlessness and the lawsuits it does seem business is

frankly booming for mercenary forces on the u.s. government payroll i mean even the worst of the worst is easy formally known as blackwater just announced that it's relocating its headquarters right here right outside of washington from northern virginia to cash in i assume on all those lucrative contracts that are available to them so what exactly is in store for americans hired guns are banned and you can file this report. this iraqi men son nine year old aliki nani was shot dead by private american war contractors four years ago his brain fell to the ground between life and on the same day dozens of other innocent iraqis were shot by trigger happy us professional killers shot like they were trying you know everyone they know want to blackwater the firm for whom the hired guns were to be punished for the massacre of two other private american security companies were contracted to carry out interrogations at the natori as abu ghraib prison in iraq

a name synonymous now with her if they can one rights violations including torture rape and murder the u.s. supreme court recently threw out a lawsuit alleging abuse of prisoners by the contractors. in afghanistan it's reported that human rights violations and with feeling that they were committed by secretive birds on a regular basis to an expense set to undermine coalition forces counterinsurgency efforts will stop firing of anything that moves in general killing and they'll destroy property. we're getting fairly consistent complaints about them everybody knows somebody who's been shot by the contracts. the lack of accountability has forced the united nations working group on mercenaries to push for specific international measures to regulate their activity especially now as u.s. military forces withdraw from iraq and afghanistan the number of contractors is set to grow dramatically u.s.

government. so many of. these. companies they are not legally fit into the end of control and this is what we expect becomes them not what we call in is for a relation at the national and international level so that is companies accountable but washington is reluctant to let international body regulate their activities saying it will find ways to hold contractors accountable but so far the u.s. justice system has largely failed to do so we're seeing around the world cases. kidnapping rape murder. and we see very very only very rare cases in which there's actually a criminal investigation or prosecution or. the. experts say for their privatization of war is convenient for the american government because among other

reasons it doesn't have to justify the deaths of troops that home the president whoever the president may be can get us involved in conflicts only using uniform forces to do the official fighting and then thousands and thousands of contractors to do the unofficial fighting that's under the radar screen that isn't covered by the media now here's a quote we cannot win a fight for hearts and minds when we outsource a critical mission on a cow. a noble contractors and of quote that's what senator obama said before he became president but apparently as a president now he thinks differently with the contractors role in america's wars down to increase and with the victims of their crime still begging for justice i'm going to check on reporting from washington our team well if i get a contractor certainly have a bad name and for good reason there's been a lot of crimes as you just saw in this piece committed by these folks but the same

time america is involved in so many wars and the public or frankly they're getting tired fed up of seeing innocent u.s. soldiers essentially getting a reward in these warfare efforts and perhaps maybe it's better idea to send people who voluntarily sign up to work as mercenary forces say some dollars and save the lives of our men and women in uniform that's a question i posed to scott horton he's a contributing editor of harper's magazine what's wrong with using defense contractors if it means more american men or women in uniform stay alive here's what he has a sec. well the question is accountability i think as several of your speakers in the in the lead up segment pointed out we have the united states has a rigorous system of accountability who are uniformed personnel there's a court martial system. there's a there are less formal disciplinary systems but there's been a complete failure of accountability with respect to these contractors they go out

on operations in iraq and afghanistan and use procedures are referred to by a professional soldiers as spray and pray they shoot areas up and hope they get a legitimate target and nothing happens even in the most egregious cases like in the source where incident two thousand and seven. were seventeen iraqis lost their lives there still has been no effective accountability for those who were onboard and it took tremendous public pressure to get the american justice department to take any action in that case but it could be argued also as horrific as those instances were there are a few bad apples and an ally of the fact that you know we have works like yours countless cases you've written about this issue a lot of sort of i want to make this a left or right issue but the mercenary problem has been really discussed a lot of both in print and in t.v. media we had there the blackwater but by jeremy scahill don't you think that maybe

the increase in public attention to this has somewhat eliminated the frequency of the horrific murders and forces that's a sort of get their act together in short no you know we have a promise of iraq obama when he was running for president made this one of his issues it is principle opponent in a democratic primary so worry clinton may articulate almost exactly the same criticisms and now we see there in office hillary clinton running the state department and the state department is proposing to field a private are. any private mercenary army of five thousand five hundred armed men under arms in the rack it is refusing even to allow the u.s. inspector general examine what's going on there so you know we really have a failure of promises and a failure of oversight here it's a mission but i think what we're seeing now from the obama administration is we're going to see

a loud plea to how the public announcement to drawdown uniformed soldiers and we may see on the back end of that replace move those soldiers with contractors with the with private security contractors and the key thing for america right now given their budget crisis is this is not going to mean any savings in fact contractors it was claimed by the pentagon for many many years they were less expensive than soldiers quite clear now that's not true and in fact they may well be more expensive so this substitution will not bring down our costs in connection with the operations neck in the sand the rack for instance and i was scott horton harper's magazine unfortunately that is it for this hour here on our team america of course the news does not end with this broadcast more stories than you know what to do it on our website is that r.t. dot com slash usa and you know to participate on accounts to get our latest stories smartphone.