canada. china operations are today. it's the news that just won't fly in the mainstream media twenty years behind bars or a russian pilot brought to the u.s. under question of all circumstances to begin with we'll bring you the curious case of constant in your shank go with a live report from new york. that reads this is should know and the basis of this is that. somehow it's been turned into something else and bailing water from a sinking ship on the third anniversary after the fannie mae and freddie mac. bailouts why was the u.s. so quick to plug the holes for big banks but not the american people will tell you why one artist says burned banks burned. i have seven years of school work i do.

you know the start of the bottom or your way of working your way up is tough when there are no jobs in the first place so with president obama's jobs plan speech less than twenty four hours away is there a light at the end of the tunnel or just more of the same. we don't have jobs recovery and everybody knows that if people are saying where is our hoover dam the moment plus seventy five years after the opening of the hoover dam has a life of american innovation burned out and was stagnant us unemployment rate is it time to get creative. getting it's wednesday september seventh eight pm here in washington d.c. i'm lauren lyster you're watching our t.v. there's so much going on in the world but what are the big stories that you are not likely to see on us mainstream media t.v.

well what about the four hundred thirty thousand israelis some behind me who protested across the country over the weekend in the biggest protests. asked in israel's history they're demanding social justice a lower cost of living and government solutions for a struggling middle class may sound familiar if you're in the u.s. now what about the execution of troy davis the man you see there today a date was set for it to be later this month that's after u.s. supreme court decision cleared the way but just who is davis well he's a high profile death row inmate who claims he is innocent of killing this man savannah police officer you saw there now there's no physical evidence linking davis to the crime and seven out of the ten witnesses in his trial later recanted or changed their testimonies and those are just a few reasons he's become a focal point for anti death penalty activists and critics of the u.s. criminal justice system around the world and this brings me to constantine you're

shank oh he is the russian pilot found guilty of conspiring to smuggle drugs and he was sentenced this evening to twenty years behind bars in a u.s. court and he was arrested originally in liberia and secretly brought to the u.s. where he was reportedly put in solitary confinement russia has protested the way he's been treated in the u.s. first starters the u.s. failed to inform russia of his capture in the first place the u.s. side of the story was the fax the information to the wrong country was just the start of it but joining us now with the latest from new york is our t's own anastasio churkin who has been following this all and a stasia good to see you your shankar was just sentenced to twenty years behind bars what do we know about his sentencing. well laura now twenty years behind bars we've been following this case for a very long time we knew that you could be sentenced from ten to

a lifetime behind bars but really a shocker because the senate a major precedent because this is really the first time when a russian citizen is sentenced on u.s. soil who was arrested and charged as a preventative measure for an intent to do something and not actually carrying out a crime in a case built up by u.s. special agents arrested in a third country in this case liberia and then charged with something and sentence for such a long time on u.s. territory as you mentioned twenty years is the amount of time that he was told he will be spending in the u.s. prison we know that he will be eligible for parole in as much as thirteen years his defense team has thirty days to appeal this decision and yet the u.s. officials will be taking as much as two years to consider this appeal we have to see that throughout the case your show has pled not guilty many times his family up until the last minute and himself were hopeful that he would be at least facing

a lighter sentence when they found out that twenty years is what awaits him they all broke out in tears his mother who came here to witness the sentencing and support her son his wife who marty has interviewed several times including the mouth of the man himself were crying inside this courthouse in lower manhattan today because they were certainly not expecting such a long period of time well i know that you've interviewed his wife as well you've been following this case really since the start so let's back out to bring our viewers at a speed if they're not familiar with your shanker now we know his sentencing you mentioned that this is that's a very it's a precedent but what about kind of the problems with this case from the start because there were many. there were definitely a lot of curiosity is your right lauren as soon as it was made public that this russian pilot was brought on to u.s. soil the problem there was that he was snatched up as we mentioned by u.s. special agents in liberia in may last year brought to the u.s. but russian officials and the man's family did not know where he was up until june

when russian officials said this is a breach of international conduct diplomatic contact you are supposed to inform another country when you're arresting their citizen for whatever climate need be the united states as you mentioned previously said they got a fax machine was to blame for this that they sent a fax to remaining on state of russia. and this was an apology that was released but we know that russian officials have been sending letters both from here in new york and from russia saying that it would be a good idea to consider sending to russia to stand trial or serve his sentence in russia or even consider giving him a lighter sentence apparently this voice was not heard today so we're really going to have to wait and see and hear from russian officials in terms of how they're going to react to this because this is certainly a very rare case and we don't know their reaction yet as you just mentioned but you have been following this and we russia has responded you know the route the trial

to some of these issues so what is the significance of this case and the sentencing for u.s. russia relations. well you know it's hard to say for now whether this could really set a diplomatic or even political scandal or even an outbreak of you know negativity between russia and the u.s. but certainly this brings up a lot of very important legal issues we've reported here at r.t. many times in many cases where foreign citizens were brought onto u.s. soil and face trial here this is the first case when this happens to a russian and really this brings up again the question of how much power should the u.s. have over the destinies of foreign citizens because this now you are chicago has never stepped foot on u.s. soil he's never been here he has never actually committed a crime all he really did was you know have the intent according to u.s. officials to bring drugs onto u.s. soil this was never the case so legal experts are saying you know when is enough

enough how much really until u.s. officials understand that there is such a thing as international jurisdiction national jurisdiction and that citizens really sir are supposed to be tried on their own soil especially when they've never set foot on to american territory a lot of really interesting and course important and precedent setting issues as you mentioned there will continue to follow it in any new developments that happen but at that was a correspondent asked bringing us the very latest on your. scuse me his sentencing that just came down deceiving. now also today it's an anniversary three years ago the u.s. government took over the mortgage giants fannie mae and freddie mac. putting taxpayers behind the five trillion dollars in home loans that they backed now that five trillion dollars reportedly makes this the largest bailout in u.s. history was part of the rescue of financial firms and big banks that we saw during

the financial crisis back in two thousand and eight but the question that remains what did all of this do for the taxpayers exactly and did this save the u.s. economy big banks appear to be more protected than ever despite the mortgage meltdown an overwhelming evidence of fraud that is still being found today authorities haven't gone after any c.e.o.'s in charge during the collapse however police questioning a middle aged artist with a political message for the banks well that is fair game arches ramon lindo found a painter who is being treated like a terrorist suspect because of his political statement about the banks well the big banks continue to get off easy take a look. i'm not a terrorist. i'm not firebombing in banks i never even entertain the notion in anything more than the like this alex shaffer has laid out all his frustration with the financial system on canvas bad pace bad businesses should fail and

a bank is a business and somehow it's been turned into something else while artists are known for catching the spirit of the times cheaper recent paintings depicting bank buildings in golf and claims caught the eye of the los angeles police chief or was first approached while painting in front of a chase bank three weeks later the police visited his home asking him if he hated banks and planned to do that it's just bizarre because i don't feel like i've done anything outside of everything i've ever done in my heart and yet this is really touched a nerve in recent years it seems like large banks and their bosses have been protected from prosecution for their role in the devastating financial crisis now it appears banks are being protected even from an artist rush through the chaos depicted in

alatri first painting is just symbolic but the true financial chaos caused by d.p. morgan chase and other big banks is very real to many americans it's a different kind of. of terrorism that they're causing since two thousand and eight know the bank bosses in charge during the mortgage meltdown have done any jail time instead they were the recipients of bailout some bonuses well millions of americans suffered through foreclosure unemployment and financial ruin cheaters flames symbolize bringing the current system down i think we need to reform our banking system. completely besides the repeated visits from police chief are also says recent online visitors to his blog include employees that j.p. morgan chase as was members of the department of justice well that's what my.

this morning want to call it you need to get a lawyer and find out how or if you're on the watch list schieffer maintains a good sense of humor about the ordeal and his symbolic bank burning seems to be resonating with the public and i started the bidding off at one hundred twenty bucks and it's a ten thousand one hundred that's the big money statement he. teaches at a bank in los angeles ramon bill in the r t all right so that artists got some return on his investment for these bailouts but on this third anniversary it's worth asking what exactly this did for other taxpayers and for the economy unemployment is nine point one percent been around there for about two years and close to twenty seven percent of homeowners with mortgages are underwater on those mortgages that's according to people who track it and politicians are still looking for solutions as a result of all of these bad numbers this bad economic data to help us understand

if any of those solutions could work earlier i spoke with andrew schiff of europe pacific capital and i asked him first though what those bailouts have done for the u.s. economy exactly. it's been doing anything for the u.s. economy it certainly saved it save the holders of fannie mae and freddie mac. bonds what it saved i mean basically you had fannie and freddie being completely bankrupt after having made ridiculously foolish loans into the mortgage market now i don't think there's anything criminal about offering. foolish loans or even buying shares in a company that's making foolish loans that's just stupid it's not necessarily necessarily criminal but as a result of the bailout these companies should have gone down the mortgage market should have completely disappeared i mean the essential u.s. housing market should have been returned to a cash business which was which was not what didn't happen but instead all of the losses that should have been borne by fannie and freddie shareholders and bondholders and the banks that bought and sold fannie mae braun's and fannie mae

loans those people should have borne the losses i mean i think the banking system would have survived in a much more truncated form in a much more much smaller more manageable for instead all those losses get socialized and absorbed by the u.s. government and now all of the taxpayers are on the hook for those losses and the mortgage industry has pretty much survived intact and they're still making bad loans and they're still artificially pumping up the housing market which has still have has a long way to fall and we haven't even recognized those losses we just push them off into the future and short hasn't anything and you mentioned though that it has added to government debt and you i've heard you be a fierce critic of countries that you called addicted to debt or at least say that they're facing recession as a result now it's not just the u.s. i'm guessing that with their debt at one hundred twenty percent as g.d.p. that you would think that italy falls into that category and harlow just of the start let me just let me just get my conviction part of their austerity package

that they're voting on now includes a three percent wealth tax for the rich could defeat part of this leave them for the u.s. . well i don't think so and i believe that progressive taxes quote unquote are actually very regressive for an economy you cannot tax your way to prosperity in the way some may think and i think the problem extends from all the qana means that are that are basically haven't lived beyond their means for many years and that includes united states and includes most of western europe certainly including italy and these are countries that you know have had provided a very generous social safety net and who have been you know provided the means to pay for it and that includes united states and you know certainly what we're doing is we're by all these measures transferring our debts of the government and then printing trying to print money to pay those debts we're just kicking the can down the road to use an over overly use metaphor and some data type is going to be paid and it looks like

a day of reckoning is moving ever closer based on the volatility we're seeing the marketplace the confusion we're seeing in the markets and some of the more i agree just examples of over overly indebted governments around the world and clearly we need solutions and i hear what you're saying that your position is that you can't tax your way to prosperity but can i ask you can can i just ask you a personal question just to kind of sure see what you think your do you plan a variety do you like ferrari. love ferrars well i wouldn't necessarily have them myself but if you want to give me one for free i wouldn't turn it down that's why you're a fan of a right ok well let's hear a man a ferrari which is a pretty expensive car needless to say this is what he's saying about taxing the rich to solve government that eighty told an italian paper that he said you have to begin by asking it of those who have been most because it is scandalous that it should be out of the middle class so if it feel of ferrari which is one of the ultimate symbols as well as saying that come on and do not have to mean something

well i can't i can't really talk about italian tax law i'm not really pulling a lot unfortunately but i can talk a little about the united states tax policy and i can say there is a widely held myth that the that the rich now pay as low a percentage their income as it ever have which is untrue i mean warren buffett got a lot of press because he says he doesn't pay that he his secretary makes pays more taxes than he does which is only true because all of warren buffett's income comes in the phone form of dividends and capital gains and those are taxed at a fifteen percent rate but the average person who has a salary makes three hundred thousand or two hundred thousand dollars a year they pay more. than the middle class as a percentage of what they make in fact we have more people in the united states now workers who pay zero income tax than we ever have been like forty seven percent of american workers pay your income tax they pay they pay some payroll taxes that social security stuff like that but even that is very is very progressive so i mean i know i you know i make a decent salary and i get taxed close to fifty percent of what i make when you

factor in state taxes we have state the state of new york as a tax which you don't see that second level of taxation you don't see another country and then we have local taxes as well and sales taxes so that we get taxed everywhere and i know you make taxes too much higher you know the the incentive to work diminishes and the more productive elements of society stop working and they say why bother i mean it's very easy for the chairman of ferrari and warren buffett is a i've got enough money but. good though the very the top one percent don't you know did the real issue is the the top ten percent and a lot of those people work very hard i can guarantee it then if we do look at that just top one percent of the super rich isn't there a case to be made that they can turn to a more. well i don't know i mean they still pay a lot of taxes they pay a lot of taxes was it was going twenty or thirty forty percent is enough i'm not sure but you got understand those top one percent those are the job creators i mean it sounds like a cliche but those are the people who own the companies those are the people that are the innovators and those are the people that create jobs the government doesn't

create jobs private's the private sector creates jobs and you want to make it as easy as those people as easy for those people to continue their job creating efforts as possible you know is it any tax on them i didn't meet enron but you hear that no i am not a job creator and yet you don't see them creating jobs in august come on we had net zero zero zero zero job growth you have c.e.o.'s of some of these biggest companies that are making these huge salaries that are already greater than what they are companies paid in corporate i thought and cutting cost that's what the i think that that's more of a corporate issue i do think that c.e.o.'s of public companies in the united states are obscenely overpaid unfortunate i do believe in freedom and i do believe that the shareholders of those companies have as their obligation to rein in those absurd executive compensation packages that's a private issue. i'm more concerned about the entrepreneur and as a job creator and yes i mean traditionally that's where the jobs come from they're

not creating jobs now why because our economy is in horrible shape and we're so over regulated to death i mean hiring workers in the united states is not an easy it may be easier here than it is in some places in western europe but it's very very difficult from a from a from a from from a from a compensation a regulatory standpoint and as well as as a as a cause of my brother owns a small company of about one hundred fifty employees and i hear everything a bill is going our company going to try. hire hire more workers and it's not easy and certainly the illegal deck is stacked oftentimes in the employees favor so it's pirating something i think is not an easy easy task so the government could make it easier so you're saying that this is more i'm on businesses that are smaller and does not take huge corporations that we normally. do i think i think a lot of the small businesses are a lot provide a lot of the job growth and that's where i think the tax policies by the most. exacting the the public c.e.o.

you know i don't know how much innovation and leadership you get from these from the top of public c.e.o.'s they seem to me. you get you get paid millions of dollars for their companies to lose money i don't know how that important that is i don't know so i think it's the punitive taxation or or singling out certain element to tax makes any sense all i know is that when you look at the models you can tax all american workers at one hundred percent and you still wouldn't make a dent in the kind of debt that we have it's not a taxation problem it's a spending problem. that was andrew shift of euro pacific capital so speaking of spending problems economic problems let's talk more about ideas because it's the seventy fifth anniversary of the opening of the hoover dam now this is an example of a large federal government project that put people to work and it created energy at the same time it's the kind of public works projects that some call for today as a solution to the country's economic problems of modern times so as we gear up to

hear a speech from president obama tomorrow on his jobs plan the question is where have all the big ideas gone well to talk about that earlier he spoke with host of freedom maine radio's to fondling you i first asked with all of the bureaucracy and red tape in washington that didn't exist in the one nine hundred thirty s. if a grand project like the hoover dam could even be built could even be pulled off here's what he had to say. i think these kinds of stimulus packages did not solve the problem of the great depression i mean you had massive amounts of government spending throughout the 1930's increased regulation and control of business which resulted in pretty much a thirteen year long depression that was only ended by the second world war the breaking up of those kinds of monopolies after the second world war up here in canada we had almost no stimulus package and we're already out of a recession so i think what we're seeing here is a two fold fracture of the first is that governments have no money to do these

kinds of stimulus packages unless they're going to print their way into hyperinflation that's the first thing the second thing is the idea that governments will spend in times of recession and then save in times of economic growth is no longer feasible nobody really believes it governments to spend and spend and there's no money left for these kinds of projects and so i think we're really going to see the end of this kind of paradigm i think you'll see a lot of talk but not much action but this kind of stuff ok i want to get to that but but you didn't exactly answer my question because aside from the arguments that you're making about whether these kind of big projects actually solve the economic problems if for example the u.s. tried to build the hoover dam today would it even be possible for that to happen and any kind of a timely manner that addresses the need now for jobs they need now for stimulus when you factor in the department of energy the environmental protection agency osha i mean list goes on of regulatory agencies that this would have to go through . there's no question it would take years to get through all of the various hurdles

and hopscotch is that these kinds of mega projects need to go through you could do things like you could put monorail seeing you could expand existing rail system you can always build and repair roads but i think in america what is needed more than new projects is simply the repair of the existing infrastructure a lot of it was thrown out after the second world war with the baby boomers when their kids went to school and it's really facing a lot of a crumbling infrastructure in the u.s. and i think that the kind of money that needs to be spent. again i just don't see where the government's becoming the government's got a huge amount of retirees heading into retirement for who are going to be drawing on these public sector pensions and social security problems medicare medicaid wars overseas unless there's going to be some savage cuts elsewhere i don't see where they're going to get the money for this kind of stuff well aside from where the money is going to come from you're talking about repairing infrastructure and that is something that president obama is expected to announce as part of his jobs plan which is coming out with on thursday night so is this something that could help with the united states is unemployment problems. there's no question that when

government fires a big water cannon of money that unemployed people they get picked up and thrown into jobs but the problem is is seeing the unseen costs of this kind of action so you might get millions of people who get government jobs from this kind of spending but that money is going to come from somewhere it's going to come from the private sector it's going to come out of other people who might be otherwise creating jobs what america needs to do with my very strong opinion is regulations oversight of small businesses cut taxes so that they can be kind of economic growth but at the moment you know they'll be lots of people who'd be very happy and will vote for obama if he's going to promise them jobs but the unseen costs of this kind of stimulus spending can go on for years obviously seen this in japan twenty years of stimulus and they're still in a recession and my question to you is what do these kind of shovel ready construction jobs are you know obama's plan to split it will be repairing roads and helping to build schools those sorts of thing one of those jobs for for example laid off your kratz or laid off financially professionals or people who work in

i.t.t. can't find work or college grads who can't find work. well with the exception the last two i would think would put them through some useful benefits or rather that mean i've got to have your threats out there building schools then shuffling paperwork that at least that's something tangible to show they get a few calluses and look a little better perhaps i don't know if it's that simple that we actually sent our producer out to talk to some construction workers next door and there's a charge that under repair we asked them how easy it would be for a stockbroker to do you his job here's what that worker said. yeah yeah beverly it's just like anything over the years you have with me and i have seven years of school in the world i do it so you know you've started the model work your way of getting very you know. would come in go on from there to yeah it would be a smooth transition and then it would be good to go so it's not like you just you know walk out of corporate america and are qualified to go build

a school i mean you just heard from a construction worker who said that he trained for seven years or something so with it's not that easy to put just everyone to work doing these kind of jobs well but remember in the u.s. of course there's massive amounts of people who were involved in the housing boom who have from classic trade skills who are currently lying idle so i think that there's enough unemployment etc that you could for the foreseeable future no matter how much you spend you'd still be a great off unemployment numbers from those people before you got to be sort of white fingered white collar office workers who may not be that much it's an interesting discussion i was host of freedom and radio step on and speaking of government spending one point two trillion dollars of it of course has gone to wars in iraq and afghanistan since two thousand and one but ten years later do people feel the money spent has been worth it that's a question or harshness of the resident dot net ask people on the streets.

the so-called war on terror that launched after the tragic nine eleven attacks on the us has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars by some estimates so ten years later has the effort been worth it this week let's talk about that i think it's more secure and. i think that i believe that yes is it trillions of dollars safer. i can say that the war actually and started more terror but it's that's my opinion but that's the european opinion so to speak as you know the europeans are not as aggressive in the war against terrorism as the americans so both america and the u.k. anybody is involved in it just just back off. and that's a hard to know because if you to back away think one way and you don't want to let the terrorists win so it's just it's not easy to come up with the right answer if anybody wants to you know to cause trouble or to or to provoke some kind of attack

they can do so with or without a war so would you categorize the war on terror as a failure. as unnecessary do you think the world are safer because of it i don't know i think that we have been out offending day-i court waiting for to get in more than three hours and i think that maybe is excessive but i don't know how do you think that we're giving up too much liberty in the world in the name of security i think that yes the danger is very close we have to give more liberties and if the world becomes safer or maybe we can get them back you're ok with giving them up for a while yeah i think so we should probably stop using the word for some for for starters and a war on terror stop using the phrase just it's just a stupid phrase and was coined for political reasons i think we should should stop using bad and just just do what needs to be done whether or not you think it's been worth the effort the bottom line is the war on terror.