taxes. i would characterize obama as a charismatic version of american exceptionalism. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so for like sleep you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here sees some other part of it and realize that everything is ok if you don't i'm trying hard welcome to the big picture. says. let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right here in the lead i think iraq the families need a one hundred twelve. whenever the

government says they are keeping safe get ready because if you give them their freedom. for. food. for. a.

all right it's time for show and tell last time we wanted to get your take on what is going on with the debt ceiling here in washington so we asked you who you think is to blame for the current stalemate on capitol hill well if you use that let's go to producer patrice and assented to see what you have to say. ladies and gentlemen citizens of all ages what we have here is a circus a media circus with an elephant and a junkie and a death defying high wire all of us in the audience scramble from side to side hoping whatever falls it doesn't hit us on the head it's a dangerous act we're only the audience can be badly hurt. so why are we all here and whose fault is it anyway about half of your response is put the blame on just one political party like saeed who believes the blame falls

clearly on the republican party robert agreed saying most definitely the republican party roughly the other house of you guys who responded agreed with scott who said the blame belongs to all politicians every last one of them then there is one comment from like who are we to blame for electing these people to represent us so for where moment we are all under the same time politicians and citizens of all shapes and sizes and beliefs now someone needs to tell the elephant in the back off that high wire before the whole show comes tumbling down. all right thanks for giving us your input and here is our next question for you now we've talked about the differences between the way norway and the u.s. look at crime and punishment so we want to know which prison system you think is more effective norway or the united states you can listen to my monologue over again if you want to see those stats and let us know what you think which prison system do you think is more effective unite. states are norway you can respond on

facebook twitter and on you tube and who knows your response just might make it on air. now it's probably one of the last issues that you would ever think would be up for public debate private circumcision back in one thousand nine hundred six a lot having a fact big crime and lies the cutting of the female genitals under the age of eighteen but now some want that law to expand to boys as well and yes talk of course again has actually divided a city but it's actually united jewish and muslims who are working to fight limits that they say would violate freedom of religion it's complicated it's personnel hunted down and dirty. to san francisco to see how this issue has landed force again in the national spotlight. it's one of the most colorful cities in america as full flavor as it is people with homes stacked on top of one another like building blocks san francisco california has always been

a place where the hills are steep and so too are the issues. this time around the battle is over circumcisions to be or not to be forced circumcision is fundamentally a human rights violation i feel that. children whether boy or girl the fundamental rights to all the body parts that they were born with jonathan conti is part of a group that collected more than seven thousand signatures in favor of banning what they call male genital mutilation within the city limits and have to put the issue on the november ballot if passed the circumcision of anyone under eighteen would be a crime resulting in jail time and a one thousand dollars fine this outrage religious groups who see it as a direct attack on their religious rights jus' like be poor if you have joined forces with muslims to defend age old traditions this is a hate fueled campaign. when to curtail civil liberties in calvin's in san

francisco she and many argue it's a parent's choice. the majority of american men are circumcised and according to the world health organization circumcised men have a lower risk of penile cancer sexually transmitted diseases and the sixty percent less chance of contracting h i v but at the center of this debate religion people want to have their kids circumcised they should i mean major religions believe in it for over two or three thousand years so i think it's a little bit of a slap to jews and muslims to just say circumcision is now illegal your freedom to practice religion and someone else's body religion is not a blank check to inflict harm upon your children the vast majority of the world central america south america new zealand australia most of europe the practice is virtually unheard of some have taken it a step further matthew hass the author of the bill is also the creator of the comic

for skin man a superhero that saves babies from the evil doctors and parents trying to circumcise them this comic book has some of the most disgusting vile anti-semitic images that appeared to be lifted out of nazi era propaganda the idea of a you know force in man is an area i'm looking superhero who's going to come in save babies from the evil jewish blood thirsty rabbi is disgusting the debate over circumcision has polarized this city with people taking sides on both religious and personal grounds well it will all come to a head here at san francisco's civil court where our judge will decide whether or not the issue will be left up to voters some of whom say they'll vote to leave things as they are if you make a law about it it's going to defend a lot of people a there's a lot of history there that make their own decisions in that and i trust him to make the right decisions for their children to you and others who say. they may be

children at the time of the procedure but it's a decision they have to live with when they grow up this is a baby a life of mostly a middle life from a and it's not baby decision vote or no vote the battle lines over circumcision have now extended far beyond the borders of san francisco becoming a national debate bringing what was once a purely private issue into the public domain reporting in san francisco christine for is now party. it's an interesting topic and speaking of laws there is one now on the books that really that allows for widespread government spying on americans communications back in two thousand and eight congress passed it protected then president bush's warrantless surveillance program under the law when it was passed and while now it seems everyone in washington is focused on the debt ceiling wired spencer ackerman is reporting on danger room that they might be pulling one over on us they he says a group of senators may be meeting in secret today to consider renewing that law

it's called the size and means act it technically allows spy agencies to monitor communications related to a foreign power or its agents where the person is believed to be outside of the u.s. but if the other person is inside the u.s. his or her phone and internet records are fair game but the bigger problem is this since the law does not force spy agencies to give details about who it wants watched critics say it is a pathway to blanket surveillance drone me now from our new york studio is targets executive director of the bill of rights defense committee to tell us how scary this is how scared we should be thank you for being with us. thanks for having me yeah so i want to back up and talk just briefly about this law because there again once experts say that the public has really never gotten an explanation from congress or from the justice department about what the law authorizes in terms of massive surveillance of americans communications but what circumstantial evidence

has come out that's been the most compelling that has worried civil liberties groups the most. there are lots of reasons to be concerned here and i'd look as much to patriot in the usa patriot act as i would to the foreign intelligence surveillance both of them you'll recall of an act that over the last ten years patriot ten years ago and is only three years ago but in each of these cases we see the executive branch repeatedly extend authority it's sort of ram them down the throats of the legislature and at least in the patriot contacts abuse even those expanded authorities and we could look to national security letters here for perfect example of the government reaching even beyond the extraordinary powers that it's secure and ten years ago neither patriot nor pfizer have ever been subject to a full and transparent today the thought is amendments act of two thousand and eight is so aggressive with respect to the bill of rights that every federal court ever to have reviewed the program on its merits has struck it down as

unconstitutional those rulings however of never stood on appeal and so we're left with this act that was essentially passed in secret to authorize secret executive surveillance of law abiding americans enmasse and i think there's plenty of reasons to be concerned especially given the congress seems to be asleep at the switch i flipped a switch and yet talking about it under the radar right now during a very highly publicized debate over the debt do you think they're doing that on purpose so that if does not get attention. i wouldn't be surprised i mean there's certainly been other instances in which congress has affirmatively ovoid publicity for its domestic national security acts that impinge on civil liberties one just happened this very week. house voted as the senate did last week to entrench the f.b.i.'s leadership for the first time since j. edgar hoover and director mueller was confirmed by the senate i believe just yesterday and this intrenchments of the bureau's abuses in the face of documented

abuses we know that there have been violations of civil liberties and civil rights we know that those abuses have expanded. in recent years and yet still when confronted with an opportunity to force accountability on the executive branch and the congress throws up its hands and in this case it throughout this is very quietly while whole you know there's this huge partisan fight on the debt ceiling it does seem it does seem to be the case that congress can very very easily transcend partisan divisions at every opportunity to sell out the rights of the american people to the nation's intelligence services as a very very provocative point that you make and i want to get to that but i want to back up to something you said earlier when you said that these laws went beyond what congress intended and one of the things that is been brought to light about this amendment defies the act that some people believe which some senators have now raised a fuss about it saying that this was not that there's a secret part of it that was never intended based on what they you know voted for

and julian sanchez from cato who's wrote a little wrote written a lot about this he argues that the circumstantial evidence suggests that this law allows for location tracking of cell phones and he cited a confirmation hearing this week of an intelligence officer it may be what you're talking about where one of the senators who's raise a fuss over this repeatedly asked at the intelligence community uses call site data to track the locations of americans inside the country do you think that this is what's going on and this is what this law allows for. it very well might be the case of this is the problem of executive secrecy no one knows and even congress senator wyden whose comments you reference he has this is not the first time he has attempted to gain more information for the public about programs that are essentially secret he had a similar concern when the patriot act was being reauthorized this spring years ago even before the obama administration took office senator wyden who's been on the intelligence committee for some time in the senate said that if americans knew what

was happening every day there would be widespread outrage but because so much of this information is hidden from the public. there's insufficient outrage i think there is absolutely a coordinated attempt to hide the ball from the american public i could think of many other examples where government policy isn't really insufficiently transparent and you name some of them but really quickly i want to ask is there anything you ask or know that makes these high agencies both holes in to be more transparent with the public or congress. absolutely not and in fact it's not only the case that there's nothing forcing transparency but calling for seems affirmatively inclined to actively resign what few opportunities it does to force transparency when there are opportunities to for instance challenge the f.b.i. the other ship or the n.s.a. leadership or the d.n.i. the director of national intelligence about the way that these laws are being interpreted and used you very rarely say any critical questions come out of congress and even when you do see thoughtful questions when it comes time to vote

you know there is there's no concerns and you know every parent went so far and i want to thank you for giving us that insight maybe the law they should be debating as one to limit spy agencies from going to happen or forcing them to talk about it thanks for being on the show. thanks for having me. as the to come here they often release the ads about being a vegetarian but their latest p.r. move are in them tonight school titled bored and stick around for happy hour the debt ceiling debate has apparently caused washington to proc a bit politicians comparing it to that a movie characters in the white house even a rep for old and where all are we'll be right back. if you don't know sometimes you see a story and it seems so schooling sleep you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else here's you some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm charged as a big. early

on. and you know. lets not forget that we had an apartheid.

i think. either one well. we never got that says they're very safe get ready for freedom. all right it's time for tonight's told time award and we are getting it to heat up people for the ethical treatment of animals for an unethical campaign ad the organization has a long history of some over the top i campaigned we have highlighted some of them

here on this show from a t.v. commercial that was back from the super bowl earlier this year if not murder. and the n.p.a. didn't have to run that ad all the publicity and media coverage it got was a plenty and it was free now if you search online you can find plenty of other celebrities who are stripped down for here's a quick sample of some of those. sexy well now the organization is taking heat yet again but this time it is not for racy ads expert display that some are finding quite offensive now peta has

a new exhibit on the national mall here in washington the title is glass walls the name comes from the line on the card he once said he said if slaughterhouses how glass walls everyone would be vegetarian ok fine mccarty also narrated a documentary about the meat industry called glass balls fair enough here's the weird part the exhibit compares the impression of animals to the oppression of human beings like oh as in every exhibit also reportedly shows images of child laborers lynched black people and cambodian genocide victims to make a point about animals in slaughterhouses now peta spokes person was asked about this and was quoted in ross story as saying what this says is let's stop thinking about whether one victim is more important than another whether one act of gratuitous violence is more they're all horrible we condemn them all ok come on are these people in la la land i mean i like animals i worry about

slaughterhouses and there are plenty of normal and sane arguments to make the case to people about what is wrong with slaughterhouses but i think most rational people would make a pretty logical distinction between killing animals that a lot of people eat food and genocidal and racist atrocities committed against human beings. i don't know we think peta should stick to raise the ads with women getting naked if this is the alternative so for their new offensive and out of touch with reality display on the national mall we are giving tonight's tool time award to peta. all right it's time for happy hour joining me tonight is our t.v. producer jenny churchill and mike riggs he's associate editor at reason magazine and reason dot com thanks for being here guys. we had some good stuff today the

debt debate i think it's getting a little bit. not tense on capitol hill as much as people are getting a little loopy yesterday we told you how house g.o.p. members watched the clip from ben affleck's movie the talent for inspiration but now all the holywood comparisons on the hill are continuing today senator mccain cited one of the most well known movies of all time when he was talking about the debt. then ghana had no choice but to pass a balanced budget amendment and reform entitlements and the cheap party could return to middle earth having defeated morgul or ok tea party ave and then rand paul actually responded to me keynes comments he said i rather be a hobbit then a troll and then they continued sharon angle is gone and paul saying the lord of the tarp is sucking up for obama the lord i'm going to bring. this

i honestly don't even know what to say about this it's so bizarre and also i think calling someone a hobbit as a dig is a little weird you know the hobbits were kind of the heroes of the lord of the rings series and they're loyal and true you know they're really hairy and so i don't really understand he's obviously going off the stereotype that hobbits aren't unappealing and i think it's interesting to say the people in middle america have big feet i'm just. writing ideas like on dream image of like mental midgets or something which is fascinating because you stump for sharon angle so i don't know where he gets off complaining about her but you know the all the movie imagery i think shows like the desperation like you're getting down to the line the caucus the republican caucus is not behaving like people like john mccain and john boehner want to be some of the resorting to the sort of movie imagery to inspire people keep their attention yeah yeah maybe i am bored now i know they've realized that everybody is just like oh this is all politics and ridiculous so they're like god

we have to make people care and they will like you know the lord of the rings series well on that note in our office is actually sparked a very intellectual conversation about what is the difference between a troll and a hobbit. every member station everybody in the newsroom was telling me on the differences i do not want to get john mccain you know he's going to be really good about this he's got america thinking about the war the rates again success ok success speaking of being loopy speaking. getting a little crazy and bored with this debt debate i think the white house is in on it too so obama has been listening to americans opinions on the debt and. they've been tweeting about it and so the white house in response to a person who was complaining via twitter about how boring this all is they are well on with it they tweeted back sorry to hear that this policy or sorry to hear that you know that you're bored this whole policy is important but it can be dry sometimes so here's something more fun and they post a link to this video. from

. the white house rick rolled a twitter follower. you know you imagine if you were the person that was like i got wrecked by the white house i know that should that should be like recorded for posterity somewhere when i was no be on g.m.a. tomorrow yes exactly how did you. grow the white house i like torn between being sort of within the day and there's like really important moment that they're making jokes about that were so that's a great song and on the other hand realizing like oh my god maybe this is what we need like maybe so nice and i feel like people are like on the verge of panic i'm going to visit some family in indiana and like they're really concerned like what's going to happen i was like well just to actually call you know less than you but i'm like it's going to be hard it's ok in the white house is rickrolling people on the show you know everything is as it should maybe it's really good p.r. i'm with you though i think it's really offensive i think that says i think the

white house is a serious organization we need a committee and authority especially in these times where this i think that maybe it's i don't really mind you know i don't know i don't know i think they should be rolling twelve ball i think the white house no i think that people need to be able to identify with the white house and feel like they can you know kind of relate and i'm with you robert present you can relate to or when you feel i can lead the country a lot of problems i feel like as a real person there are there are paling is a real person to many people if you think she's qualified run. country she doesn't have a recall anybody but she hates the. first of all if your goal is really poor recall if you're going to recall someone is supposed to be like the sceptic like why are you talking about did you miss this part of the debate i gave you the white house credibility by seeming out of touch and slightly behind the trend on rickrolling all right let's move on but let's stick with politics so karl rove's organization called crossroads g.p.s. has just launched a campaign against you're probably not surprised president obama here's what some of the group's most recent ads actually look like obama's eight hundred thirty

billion dollars stimulus the show really was not. already spent fourteen million out of america drowning in debt it's time to take away obama's blank check. ok so caro rose conservative crossroads organization his campaign ads you know i did up a pretty unlikely place it ended up on grindr which if our audience doesn't know what that is it is an out that says zine to connect gay and bisexual men by showing where the closest men are to them that are gay and bisexual on that site too so this is the campaign as it's playing under the. i believe the karl rove group the response was that you know based on your browsing history this could show up anywhere it's done through another network i do sort of like you do with any that come on you it's great there i think was the only thing that he has shows up on an amp that is g.p.s. taste i love they also love the idea because it's if you're told to hold this right

and that's like a very inside repapered for washing touch i love the idea that some conservative inside washington guy who obviously browses a lot of cars are going to go. right. to i would like some absolutely you know public angling to a bathroom because i mean it's very dirty stale long lines conservative community there is a catholic who kind of sounds like the michael jackson of a cap across he likes to he's he's described as crazy as homosexuals super culture he likes attractive young men to sit on his lap and then he treats them to trips in the florida keys only problem is that he is archbishop emeritus of miami. i was going to run solve what it was actually he doesn't anymore i guess you know when you're younger and you're got last year yeah but the last year i know i knew you were super pumped you know what i mean the thing that illustrates the story goes on to talk about that all the culture and the catholic church in south florida this is

like for me it's a right and i am not against god i love gay people is a great letter mary whatever what's fascinating is that the catholic church like this is still one of their core things when they're telling people not to do it so i don't use condoms and the game and here you have it everything where it happens in florida we're going to have to leave it in that house or less we got rid of all the gay people that's what they said about that yes that can say anything after that is that for tonight show thanks for tuning in make sure to come back tomorrow alex my small profit progress will be joining us for happy hour and coming up next is adam versus the man. download the official ante up location job on the phone on called touch from the i choose ops to. watch on t.v. . video on demand oxys

minefield comes on r.s.s. feeds now with the palm of your. questions on the dot com. we'll. bring you the latest in science and technology from around the world. we are going to the future of coverage. a telemarketer broadcasting live from washington d.c. coming up today on the big picture.