that's next here on out. welcome to the lower show where we get the real headlines with none of the mercy or can live in washington d.c. now tonight we're going to take a look at elections in numerous states that happened yesterday republican proposals for the most part were rejected by voters so are we seeing a reaction to last year's elections and what does all mean for occupy wall street and is fair and is going to join us for that one then is it only the next greece unfortunately it could be even worse than the head of the i.m.f.

is warning that the global economy could be headed in a downward spiral and markets also plummeted today so we to look at more economic bad news with edward harrison and then did you know that almost one in four people to port of last year were the father or mother of a u.s. citizen that's right as you point a sions go up under the obama administration more children are being left behind and put into foster care but is the government actually choosing to rip families apart rather than bring them back together and report give us a mansour is going to have all of that and more feet and i couldn't get us of happy hour but first let's take a look at the mainstream media has decided to miss. i so in between is still obsessing over the herman cain saga the mainstream media has managed to make a little time for an economic story today i don't forget tonight there's going to be another republican presidential debate hosted by c n.b.c. and the economy should be topic number one of course i'm sure that a few of you know herman cain's a dirty pervert and

a liar dig will be slipped in somewhere but anyway what was the brilliant economic news they reported on today all apparently was another executive order signed by the president. and with the flourish of his pen and that famous left handed signature the president signs and executive order today the president is signing an executive order that could squeeze a few more bucks out of the budget by cutting office supplies and unnecessary travel to expect to save billions of dollars a year in just moments ago president obama signed an executive order to cut ways to promote efficient spending in washington d.c. the white house pointing out that already they've been able to save more than eight billion dollars of that one targeted at reducing government waste the agencies across the government will be asked to cut back on things such as t. shirts and mugs and other gadgets. and now i get it the president is frustrated congress is sitting on its hands doing literally nothing to spur job creation the

congressional super committee all they're not getting anywhere when it comes to agreeing just where to cut from and how to impose austerity on its citizens so the president is going with the executive order thing trimming creating where he can but let's all be very honest about this for a minute trimming so ag office supplies travel expenditures and stuff and not going to solve our financial woes it's not going to fix the fact the forty nine point one million americans are now living in poverty that's according to the revised census figures that we received this week something of the mainstream media completely ignored it's also not going to fix the fact that our lawmakers fight tooth and nail to protect defense spending which makes up more than fifty percent of our discretionary budget while putting social programs up for grabs easily another thing the mainstream media ignores it's also not going to fix the fact that at least ten million people's homes are underwater or what a new report showed us today the foreclosure sales are going moving so slowly and half of the states that the current pace it'll take more than eight years to clear those homes i haven't seen that one report on the cable networks today either but

let's talk about possibly some of the most egregious news that should be getting much more attention fannie mae the mortgage giant which you and i had our own because it had to be bailed out by. government aka our taxpayer money and whose executives just made more than ten million dollars in bonuses recently well guess what fannie mae wants another bailout they want more money fannie is now asking for seven point eight billion dollars in aid to cover its losses in the july through september quarter do you know how ridiculous this is fannie has already received one hundred twelve point six billion dollars from the treasury department that was the most expensive bailout of any single company out there together the fannie and freddie bailout was about one hundred sixty nine billion estimates say that the figure could reach up to two hundred and twenty billion to support the companies through two thousand and fourteen and here we see those numbers starting to add up as fannie asks for seven point eight billion more so basically there goes all that money that the president's going to save by not allowing federal offices to have swag anymore because the swag are going to fix our system ending too big to fail

just might and yet the mainstream media would rather focus on the small fries and the peas and the carrots and take a good look at the bigger picture. well yesterday was an election day in a number of states across the u.s. and yesterday saw some big results in ohio the anti-union legislation that would have limited collective bargaining rights failed with almost sixty one percent of voters rejecting the law in maine by a margin of sixty to forty percent voters rejected a new republican law that would have ended the same day voted rate voting registration and in mississippi the personhood amendment that would have divined life as beginning at conception which not only was an attack on women's reproductive rights but also a confusing horrible piece of legislation well that also lost so how do we look at all is a fresh ray of hope that no matter how extreme our politicians get the people don't

necessarily follow is a good sign for obama and all the democrats in two thousand and twelve and where does occupy wall street fit into it all joining me from our studio in los angeles to discuss it is and it is fairy and co-host of the young turks and a thanks so much for being on tonight and looking at everything that happened yesterday in these elections would you say that there are symbolic of something that's happening in this country. they are symbolic i think that some democrats are going too far when they're considering this a huge win for them i mean for instance in arizona you have. russell pearce being elected out of office in the recall election and now you have jerry lewis in place but when you really look at jerry lewis his track record and his stances on political issues he's also extremely conservative and he also has similar stances when it comes to immigration policy when you look at mississippi yeah mississippi decided to reject the personhood amendment but at the same time they have so many

issues when it comes to prosecuting women who give birth to stillborn babies or when it comes to tightening their voting laws for instance they need to have state approved identification for people who want to participate in elections who want to actually go out there and vote and some people say like oh that's that's a reasonable thing to ask for except when it comes to the poor and certain minority groups it's very difficult for them to have access to identification or proper identification to vote so there is an issue there so it's symbolic in certain ways because it shows that maybe the country isn't as radical as some people thought it was but at the same time you know we still have a long way to go because we're so far to the right at this point so i guess are we just wasting time trying to get back to normal it's not like republican policies here are being rejected outright it's just slowly trying to creep back to to where we started from. no i think that we should definitely continue fighting and you

know you mentioned occupy wall street and whether or not you know this has anything or whether or not the protests have anything to do with the results we're seeing in these elections and i absolutely do think that it does i think that americans are finally waking up and they're looking at what our domestic policy was back in the eighty's compared to what it is now and we have shifted so far to the right and people are realizing like hey you know immigration is a huge issue here in the united states but we need reasonable immigration reform we can do things that profile and discriminate against people of color and i love that i think that it's really great and even in mississippi a state that's so highly conservative and only has one abortion clinic for them to reject the personhood amendment i think is extremely symbolic and it means that you know we are fighting the good fight and people in america are not as exterior as some people think yeah i have to admit i disagree with

a lot of the policies that are out there but the mississippi personhood amendment is something that was probably some of the craziest legislation i've ever seen and actually gave me a little ray of hope today a little faith in humanity that something like that did not pass the god we haven't completely lost our minds here in the u.s. at least that's the way that i see it but now going back to occupy wall street and you brought in where it fits in here this means that people we don't have exact numbers here this means that people actually did end up going to the polls today they did and going through the typical political system that's not necessarily. want because a lot of people there say that we need to reform the whole thing so the fact that people are voting is a is a good or is it actually kind of bad for occupy wall street. well i think that people going to the polls is still very important because you know you have things like the amendment in mississippi not passing and it's not only symbolic it's also essential for the freedoms that we enjoy here in the united states so i think that

discouraging people and telling them to not go to the polls is not the right move but what i think occupy wall street has been very successful with is basically bringing attention to issues that people never really paid attention to before so for instance that story that i brought up with mississippi prosecuting women who give birth to stillborn babies that is an issue that wasn't covered by anyone else i think think progress did a story on it you did a story on it the young turks did a story about it but no one really focused or paid attention to it but now you have occupy wall street and what's great about them is you know some people criticize them for not having like a direct message and focusing on one specific thing but occupy wall street cover such a broad range of issues that we have in our political system and people are now starting to pay attention to those issues so i love that people went to the polls i think it's important to still do that but i do agree with occupy wall street when it comes to reforming our political system and getting rid of things like corporate personhood which is a huge problem in our democracy. now one of the things that occupy wall street or

a lot of people who are taking part in occupy wall street support is taking your money out of the big banks transferring it to local credit unions and of course this last weekend was november fifth people call the bank transfer day and it turns out that just on that one day just on saturday forty thousand people did and closing their accounts and previous to that they had found just in a month from september to october about six hundred fifty thousand people had to close their accounts do you think that means the success there or is forty thousand a little bit disappointing. no i think that there is absolutely success as you mentioned since september i actually read a different report that said that up to eight hundred thousand people since september have transferred their money to credit unions and i think that that is great proof that occupy wall street is really spreading the message and they're doing so effectively because you got to keep in mind most people didn't really think about transferring their money out of big banks and going to credit unions

and now people are frustrated occupy wall street gave them a very easy way to act on their frustrations a little way to act on their frustrations and people are actually doing something that i think proves that they have a voice that they have the ability to make changes and you know to be honest with you i'm one of the people who transferred my money out of one of the big banks because of bank transfer day and it was such a liberating thing to do it felt really great and i think that occupy wall street's message has that effect on a lot of people here in the u.s. so it has been successful i think the mainstream media is continuing to kind of discredit them and say that they haven't had an influence but keep in mind i think that this movement is still in its infancy so considering all the changes that have happened so far i think that it's been highly successful now lastly when you and i spoke about of course mississippi personhood amendment there are a number of states now that are looking at collective bargaining rights when it comes to unions as well as they try to make it harder for people to vote voter

registration voter id laws and you know this one in maine yesterday didn't pass but how damaging do you think that all that is going to be when it comes to the two thousand and twelve elections. i think it will be extremely damaging you know there was recently a poll done it was by quinnipiac and they said that the g.o.p. right now only has a twenty eight percent approval rating which is extremely low and only a fifty seven percent approval rating i mean this approval rating i should say so people are very upset with the g.o.p. and you know i think it's because. they've kind of shown that they're extruded mana lot of issues and the majority of people in the united states are not radical they're not extreme they want reasonable policies and they realize that you know some of the policies that the g.o.p. has either proposed or passed has have not been successful so i think that this election has or should send a message to the g.o.p.

right now whether or not they're going to get it through their thick skulls i don't know i guess we'll have to wait and see all right and i thank so much for joining us tonight. thank you. for coming out with all the talk about spending cuts in washington point out a prime example of government waste tonight a look at the tens of billions of dollars the u.s. is spending on your weapons and is it only about to drive down the eurozone even further and i will try to make heads or tails out of the deepening financial crisis in europe and how it's going to affect the u.s. backing a strong. nature and discover it's been. communicated with the want to. test yourself and become free.

see what nature can give you on the. wealthy british style. that's going on right. market why not. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike stronger for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune in to conjure reports on our. we've discussed the start treaty in depth on this show the agreement between presidents obama and medvedev to reduce the number of nuclear warheads to fifteen hundred in both countries arsenals now is a pretty logical step considering the fact of the us hasn't actually fired

a nuke in decades and has no reason to and in fact the pentagon conducted a nuclear posture review last year which concluded that the massive a nuclear arsenal we inherited from the cold war era of bipolar military confrontation is poorly suited to address the challenges posed by suicidal terrorists and unfriendly regimes seeking nuclear weapons so even the pentagon here seems to agree that our massive nuclear stockpile isn't suited to the actual military threats that we face but looks like that isn't stopping us from shelling out the big bucks on it adam weinstein and mother jones did some digging it turns out of the u.s. military industrial complex includes quite a massive nuclear weapons complex get this during the cold or cold war era when the us was relying on nukes our country spent about thirty five billion dollars a year on the program and despite the fact that many within the d.o.d.'s say the nukes aren't relevant anymore the us currently spends about fifty five billion dollars a year on these weapons and i say about because the nuclear weapons budget is spread between three departments defense energy and homeland security and none of

these revisions give figures on how much it spends on maintaining or building nukes in fact it's so tough to get a gist of exactly how much is spent the last time anyone trying to get figures was in two thousand and eight when the current carnegie endowment for peace determined that the us spent at least fifty two billion dollars on nuclear weapons just that year sounds like a lot well that's because it is a nuclear budget for zero eight was five times the size of the state department's seven times the size of the e.p.a.'s budget so why is there even more money being spent on this program now and there was during the height of the cold war i was weinstein points out the start treaty limits both russia and the us to fifteen hundred deployed warheads of peace but the us has five thousand total warheads many of those extras need to be destroyed and their facilities in the us to dismantle. the war has however that's quite a tricky process that carries a lot of risk and the process is so slow that there are thirty five hundred nukes that are just sitting around waiting to be scrapped so you can imagine the news warheads are starting to pile up now it also doesn't help the nuclear warheads are

very low priority for the government since the nuclear weapon complex is essentially been running on autopilot for decades the government hasn't spent too much time determining how to get rid of those good old warheads now instead their focus has shifted to nuclear warhead development to point with new facilities linked to the department of energy popping up all over the country now some of these plants come with a price tag of four point five billion dollars meanwhile only one percent of all the money within the nuclear complex currently goes to dismantling and destroying all those warheads all of the nuclear complex continues to grow the national nuclear security administration has just been awarded an additional eighty five billion dollars over the next ten years now the government accountability office has issued for reports highlighting the wasteful spending by the n.s.a. but since it's an untouchable branch of the government officials conveniently turn a blind eye to such alerts so one can only hope at the start treaty is going to help bring to a close some of the wasteful spending on the nuclear warhead complex as the u.s. is forced to focus more on destroying rather than creating new nuclear weapons the

money should shift towards dismantling projects bringing down america's arsenal and hopefully the incredibly bloated budget. now keeping with the nuclear theme for a moment tonight the u.s. department of energy is investigating a plutonium accident in idaho and online reports a decades old plutonium powder escaped from a damaged shelf at idaho national laboratory and sixteen workers might have been exposed to harmful radiation to those workers of radioactive material and their lungs department of energy officials and private contractors are monitoring the two workers at the lab in eastern idaho now so far none of those potentially exposed are exhibiting any outward symptoms of radiological exposure and the lab director says that stainless steel cladding that surrounds plutonium fuel was damaged which began a slow but steady process of releasing the plutonium that led to the exposure of plutonium fuel dates back to the one nine hundred seventy s. so something says that maybe this lab needs an update and let you know if there are any further developments. now despite silvio berlusconi announcing yesterday that

he would step down as prime minister once an austerity package is agreed upon it doesn't look like he's calmed anyone's nerves italy's public debt has reached an estimated two point six trillion dollars fears that italy could default on its debt grow but yields on the country's ten year bonds above seven percent stock markets tanked today as the dow closed down three hundred eighty nine points so that's the same point at which other nations if we go back to the seven percent of the bonds when other nations like ireland greece and portugal all had to ask for a bailout funds and italian default would be much more devastating than all three of those countries combined it's the eighth largest economy in the world and the third largest bond market meanwhile stopping in china i.m.f. director christine legarde warned that if international actors don't get their act together the world risks plunging into a downward spiral of financial instability so what are we supposed to make of this up well here to discuss with me is edward harrison founder of credit write downs dot com editor thanks so much for being here nice to be here i mean just just doing

gloom all the way around basically every little thing that i read there so what do you think is going to happen right if as i mentioned here if you look at the fact of these ten year bonds or above seven percent you look at what happened with ireland with portugal with greece does italy have to ask for a bailout at this point or have to you know risk default can be built as you were saying of the u.s. largest economy third largest bond market in the world and so you know the other countries are large enough to be able to build them so they have to make the grid and the only way they can make the grid is basically by having someone there to sustain them until. they can figure out a permanent solution and the only entity that can do that is the e.c.b. because they print money right now the e.c.b. supposedly is now this is according to the european treaty basically the e.c.b. can support national government that's that's forbidden but what we've seen is they've gone into the secondary market and they've bought up in the so. very market

they can do that and continue to do that will that be enough. i think it will be but you know how much will they be able to well let's say that i say you think there just might be enough i think there are a lot of people out there that are not so sure about that and feeling a little more pessimistic let's say that it's not enough and what happens at that point does you know is the entire currency of the euro is it basically going to go in italy that's is this is the armageddon scenario we're talking serious financial armageddon we're talking a great depression type of stuff right here right now i mean basically if the. e.c.b. says you know what we were bluff we were bluffing we can go to the market we're going to put a bid out two hundred basis points over german bones which are the german ten year bonds and will buy at that level no matter what happens you know the hope therefore is that the market will move to that price and therefore the e.c.b. won't even have to buy any bonds necessarily for that but let's just say for

whatever reason that doesn't happen and you know the spiral keeps on going it is going to have to default we're going to have to you know bondholders you have to take a haircut those bondholders will be insolvent they knew how bank runs you know a depression would ensue so are you agreeing that when it comes to christine lagarde who's currently jetting around the world saying that there is a very big downward spiral that's headed for the global economy that's at risk here and what is she you know she's she's been speaking to russia she's been speaking to china saying that this has to be a global effort so what exactly to she expect will it's interesting that she said basically it sounds to me like she's saying you know the europeans they can't get it sorted out because of their institutional fragility is there for you other guys china russia. to you've got to get in there and some would help out the europeans because italy is just too large to fill and we think as long as they. go

through these austerity measures etc whatever it may be they can get over the whole i don't even think that they would be able to get over the hump the reality is that austerity makes things worse if they continue in the same path that they're on the economy is going to go to. europe is already in a double dip recession right now you know so then suddenly you see the deficit is the deficit is even larger after austerity you know it's just it's negative there are the good kids who get snagged the scenario and you know we've already seen a lot of riots all across europe especially specifically in greece did austerity measures we've seen the same thing happen in london as well and so you just wonder the more austerity cuts you know the more something like this might spread he also said that this is the big should bang this is really the great depression scenario how would that then transfer over here to the u.s. let's say that italy does go under that we see this horrible scenario play out what would happen is italy. you know then they would default their creditors would

would be insolvent the all the italian banks have been solved and a lot of the european banks be insolvent then there would be a general bank where the american banks which have also had all these credit default swaps sovereign debt in europe they would be insolvent as well do we know how much we know we don't know exactly how much it is that our banks have a stake in what we do know is that they actually increase the amount of credit default swaps that participated in in the first half of two thousand and eleven so . their exposure is larger than it was before so they're definitely exposed if someone like italy goes goes bust you have to think here's a country that wasn't even on the radar screen basically a year and a half ago there's huge exposure to that to that default that would be a really negative scenario. well that's really scary to think that this is a country that as he said i wasn't on the radar just two years ago and yet now this is happening and you know it's quick it's how quickly we've seen all the focus

shift from ireland to spain portugal to you know from greece and now very quickly to italy so who's next exactly i was going to get into the problem is the institutional structure of the euro zone that has no lender of last resort all these countries are pretty much in the same boat friends has ninety percent debt to g.d.p. germany has ninety percent debt to g.d.p. if you had a recession you know all of these countries would start missing the deficit target which in europe is three percent germany would miss the three percent hurdle their deficit would start to shoot up they'd have to step in for their banks it's an institutional problem the whole thing would and all of these countries would just go straight down the line belgium would be next year would come after that france would come out so you know it's really it's. dead but at this point do you think there's any chance that the eurozone can actually stay together i think our rome bureau could stay together what i think it will eventually i mean this is what i

think will happen they will see what exactly i'm talking about this is an armageddon scenario it's not a good thing they're going to get the e.c.b. in there to say that we're going to backstop at a certain level or certain spread to german yields things will start to calm down to a certain degree but then it up point will say we need to change the treaties in order to make make it so that we have more control over these types of fiscal activities but simultaneously will give people a chance to exit the euro zone so over the course of time some people going to exit greece's debt from that exit probably will exit spain would exit i think that you have a rump of germany probably france the netherlands austria and then beyond that it's hard to say now if he has to guess there's another republican presidential debate tonight hosted by sam b.c. we're supposed to be focusing on the. me how much time do you think they're going to spend on the heroes out in talking about what's going on there it's a good question because you know it's definitely everyone's there are screens in

america now that the stock market has gone down so they might actually spend a little bit more but probably what they'll do is they'll use it as a whipping boy you know this is exactly the problem in the united states we have. a deficit of eight percent we'll be in the exact same boat in six months if we do the same thing what we need to do is cut cut cut that's probably what we're going to hear. we'll have to wait and see and right thanks so much for joining us tonight thank you. also to can we have our wednesday edition of you said i read it and the government is deporting hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants to hear what happens to the children they leave high on a topic you will get into you just. stop

stories that russia rejects as unacceptable calls for father sanctions against iran in the wake of a you and i told me a report which claims that teheran is aiming at a building you can i. wasn't a student demonstrators have marched through central london to protest against their prices and tuition fees and higher education concert with dozens of arrested . also tensions flare up the north and call some of us three ethnic serbs have been wounded in a short time but i don't need to keep this news to you guys take every one of the remaining bones. and pieces of financial. state boring costs so much me i'm for the levels just grows claims it will fulfill all of the games to be a standard. time to go back to washington.