the mainstream media was with. god and the rest are on the rise for the youth of america tonight a look at a new report that says over a third of this country's population has been handcuffed before the age of twenty three is this a sign that our country is screwed. it's thursday december twenty ninth seven pm in washington d.c. i'm liz wahl and you're watching r.t. well more signs today that the u.s. and iran are inching closer to war this after an iranian warplane sponsor a u.s. aircraft carrier crossing the strait of hormuz now this strait is critical because it's the only sea passage to the open ocean for exploiting oil over fifteen million barrels of oil passes through here every day that's about a third of the world's oil shipments by sea the aircraft carrier iran says it's

spotted is part of the fifth fleet which is based in bahrain not too far away all the iran now flexing its muscles and threatening to cut off oil supply from the waterway this is a response to the west imposing sanctions on the country and the u.s. is vowing to use its navy station in the persian gulf to stop iranians from blocking the passage well in the wake of these events is this another sign that war with iran is just around the corner while to answer that i spoke to senior fellow for these center for advanced defense studies lieutenant colonel anthony shaffer here is his take. i really don't believe so i think all sides dale in thinking this through iranians have a great deal that is one of the things that i'd like to mention is the fact that they produce about one third of the cruel world that we currently have in church elation so one of the folks who would be hurt in wars by a conflict in this area would be the reigning. i don't think they're that

irrational secondly this is something that goes back to president carter jimmy carter back in the seventy's it is liberal as he was that there is no way we as the americans would ever stand for the straits of hormuz being cut off by anyone therefore i just don't think that the iranians are willing to call our bluff on this and frankly i think they would suffer as much if not more than anyone else because their oil can't get out either i also want to talk more about the significance of this waterway the strait of hormuz this is a crisp crucial passage and terms of shipping oil in the region if iran blocks this package passage which they say of our value to do at the u.s. moves forward with these sanctions what effect will that have. well huge it would just jack up the price of oil globally we're talking about prices and i would be i think a conservative year five to six dollars a gallon i mean unheard of prices and most importantly you're talking about a huge huge hit to the global economy and this includes all of our friends in asia

as well because they need the oil it more than we do it we the americans are down about sixteen percent of our oil coming out of the way of this or the world therefore we would be hit but not nearly as bad as the rest of the planet so i again i think all sides would have hoping they will think this thing before any sort of armed conflict would come to fruition on us and what exactly do you think iran is really trying to achieve here i-man it this is a response to the sanctions do you see the u.s. backing off as a result of this well not really no i think the sanctions are really a paper tiger the people their own people have signed up so far for the sanctions are us the rest of the world have ignored the call for additional sanctions so i think the iranians are overreacting so simply put it saber rattling i don't think iran is going to slow down this need to get way and let's talk bluntly about their nuclear program i'm one of those who believe based on my sources they have at least two nuclear weapons at this point in time the problem is they don't have

a delivery system which will take another eighteen months to two years to put together so i think we need to understand what the realities are i don't think it's there's any practical way for the west to bomb iran to prevent him from getting the bomb and on the converse i don't think the iranians really want to prompt a western response which would require which would result in them losing men material or military capability i want to talk about military capability of want to bring this up as they as they base spotted a u.s. aircraft carrier and the region i want to take a moment to compare and contrast iran and the u.s. navy fleet. so iran is equipped with twenty eight thousand personnel. sixty five aircraft twenty six submarines five for a gets two hundred twenty five vessels and warships but that is nothing compared to the us navy fleet with three hundred twenty four thousand personnel three thousand seven hundred aircraft seventy five submarines twenty seven forgets and more than

four hundred and six that's almost double that of iran vessels warships and destroyers so want to get your reaction clearly we are at an advantage when it comes to being equipped. that's correct and let's remember that we have a global responsibility they don't so those numbers are a bit mis misleading by the fact we can't have all of that larry there's just no room for it anyway secondly that the advantage we really do have is in technology we can spot them coming we can do things with cruise missiles and frankly a lot of that you know that they're currently using to close their force is from the seventy's some of the same weapons we sold the shah are still in service include f. or chains and f. four s. which were i've long since left our inventory so i think they're a huge just vanish however it doesn't change the fact that they could badly hurt us by focusing on the stories of romo's and clearly their objective is not to the fetus it's to interfere with our interests and our responsibility to keep the straits open and are we as we are seeing this escalating tension you know

a confrontation in the gulf cut and packed certainly impact the region and world peace how far do you see this ask going i don't see it going much beyond where it's at right now again i think we're going to see a lot of saber rattling the only thing i would think that would make take this to the next level is if the israelis decide to take on the nuclear program and do you know unilateral strike then there's going to be a lot of issues relating to do we the u.s. fall in with them to help them or do we back off that's a question that no one seems to know the answer of so i do believe you'll see the iranians continue to prompt. they make us attempt to overreact but i think their focus really is going to be on our iraqi leader not trying to gain more influence in iraq so why would you want interference with interfere with doing that and i think that's what they're really going to focus on the rest of this i do believe is saber rattling for the most part so what about do you do you see that president obama declaring war with iran no i don't there's three three elements here and

competition you have the military war fighters who have plans to do this we always have plans to go in to do something you have president obama who's been very clear and reluctant to do take any military action and then you have the right. candidates the republicans are all literally trying to say that they would go to war with iran which i think the rhetoric is hugely unhelpful in the current situation so those three elements are right now in conflict frankly i just don't see the americans doing anything to provoke the iranians but clearly there is interest in keeping that strait open remember what it takes and that would require president obama to take military action if the iranians really did something to close it off as certainly we are seeing are a lot of rhetoric especially from the republican candidates i mean at how do you think that impacts the chances of coming to a peaceful resolution in the region when we are seeing so much of this harsh rhetoric almost pushing to go to war. from these candidates we have to look at this

the chess game the checkers game i will say this directly the republican candidates what you're saying is that they're like chess they're don't like checker players then we need to look at the region from the perspective of pakistan afghanistan iran iraq so to arabia syria we have to understand all of those things and not simply push on want to assume that we can get away with it so i think that the wisest course of action going forward is accepting the iranians will probably have if not already a nuclear weapon and try to deal with them as a regional power and not provoke them i think the republican rhetoric is not helpful this one time i don't think that republican candidates even if they were elected would be able to fall through with any military action even if they wanted to hear such a lot of what anthony thank you for weighing in on this that was lieutenant colonel anthony shaffer a senior fellow with the advance with the center for advanced defense studies. well still ahead on our take the mainstream media has no problem labeling ron paul as a fringe candidate but can they really label him as extreme if he shares the same views

as many americans tonight we'll ask if some people are playing dirty politics. new website with twenty four seven live streaming newsstands what to do about the

ongoing financial hardship unlimited free high quality videos for download. and stories you never find on mainstream news. coming down the sell me all the political. posturing more on our two dollars. that. let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right now. i think barack obama is beatable and want to well. whenever government says they're going to keep you safe get ready because you get your freedom.

back or flimsy law and banking system and the free child that is mine and nothing people are suggesting she's told her no she says she's a young star. well the attacks against presidential candidate ron paul just keep on coming since ron paul's surge in the polls in iowa seems the mainstream media has been focusing on taking him down his stereo over newsletters his staffer of decades ago but what about everything else the candidate stands for like his foreign policy which clearly separates him from the others and it's clearly resonating with more and

more americans today stopping the wars abroad shrinking government spending advocating civil live civil liberties whereas the discussion on all of this and the mainstream media well to discuss this i spoke to journalist michael tracey here's what he had to say. well the mainstream media frankly has never felt it necessary to afford ron paul substantive coverage it was only in the last two weeks when he ticked up so dramatically in the polls in iowa that they felt it necessary to vet him as they would any other candidate. ron paul actually has been leading the polls has been in the top tier of the national polling for a good portion of two thousand and eleven and until now when it's actually his candidacy is considered viable by these mainstream media types that they you know. go through his passion to sort out some of his loyalties now ron paul he is seen as this fringe candidate as his kind of an extremist i'm quite far outside of the

mainstream thinking like here's what gay rights activist dan savage recently said about paul. to show what he says is ron paul may not like gay people and may not want to hang out with us or use our toilets but he's content to leave us the f. alone and recognizes that gay citizens are entitled to the same rights as all other citizens so that kind of shows that ron paul isn't that extreme as specially when you have someone like rick santorum that he wants to restrict gay rights by law so what do you think about that ron paul being labeled extreme when he does take some balance approaches just just as the one we just we just pointed out. well i think it's very illuminating to consider what mainstream media figures can believe constitutes extreme positions or extreme enough positions that the

candidate espousing them should be disqualified from serious consideration so you have newt gingrich for example who has called for the execution of drug dealers who wanted to forcibly intercede to halt the construction of the ground zero mosque who's warned about the potential of electromagnetic pulse attacks if gingrich were to win the iowa caucus this would be considered you know perfectly normal appropriate and mitt romney for example has said that the withdraw from iraq is one of barack obama's greatest failures he's a law did the suharto regime in indonesia if you can believe in southeast asia. and yet it's ron paul who has actually called attention to civil liberties and drug prohibition and now the racially discriminatory sgrena tory nature of drug laws that is considered beyond the pale so it's very revealing insight into how modern media discourse kind of operates and which views are

pushed out on the terms of. their propriety or lack thereof what do you think it is about ron paul that makes him such an easy target among his opponents among the mainstream media i mean some say that the only thing that republicans and democrats liberals and conservatives agree on is that they don't want ron paul in office. well i think it's because he doesn't fit neatly into the left or right paradigm that mainstream media in their functionaries throughout the government help intrench ron paul has specifically disavowed that paradigm as not being adequate to describe where he how he views his political philosophy and his educational mission as a longtime libertarian you know just yesterday ron paul was asked about the tea party and the occupy wall street movement and he actually said that he has affinity with both. and of course this comes as a shock to the people in at c.n.n.

for example and other outlets of that nature who expect very simple easy to pigeonhole answers to these major philosophical questions from paul kind of penetrates through that orry discourse and people are sick and tired of and i think that's why his message is resonating in iowa also kind of want to talk about the timing of this smear campaign against ron paul why now i mean these letters have been around for decades they haven't been a secret but they're just now resurfacing and capturing and captivating much of the media why now. well you know as i mentioned earlier even even up to a month or so ago it would be very common for political journalists in america to scaf that the suggestion that ron paul should be contended with as a viable candidate for the republican nomination even now they claim that.

so. so rather than apply due diligence and sort out his past liabilities as they have with other candidates this is now being presented disingenuously as a shocking new revelation where as you you noted the newsletter controversy was thoroughly documented to two thousand and eight nothing that has been written about it now is actually new at all but you know this is this part of a chorus of predominantly right wing. vitriol that is coming out of certain quarters of the conservative movement in response to his impending win and i would even have people at the washington examiner philip klein for example have suggested that ron paul on account of his apprehension about the about israel's attack on gaza in two thousand and nine. helped abet a global conspiracy to undermine israel i mean this is a very serious charge and it's being leveled against the individual who may well win the republican the first republican primary contest so it's very interesting

development in american politics and i think it reveals a lot of the you know kind of odious orthodoxy that underlie conservative thinking and especially authoritarian minded thinking because you're finding ron paul attracting support even on the left in some quarters and among independents and people who. again fit neatly into the left right paradigm michael thank you so much for weighing in on that was journalist michael tracey. new study shows the number of adolescents arrested is on the rise after the break we'll find out what's causing this trend of arrested development here in the u.s. . me how many. people calling like you said for free and fair elections. and we're

still reporting from the. map you can hear behind me loud explosions. i mean. i got it gave. the initial police corruption in the in the what is the test the over the seems to know. that never break the face of the argument that they're being overly dramatic.

the eve. of the capitol hill to climb gloria mr.

well today's youth in america seems to be growing more troubled a new study shows a staggering amount of young people getting arrested these days according to the report by age twenty three forty one percent of adolescents have been arrested at least once for something other than a minor traffic violation the study doesn't give details on the crime so it's unclear what exactly they're getting arrested for but it looks at seven thousand

young people between the years of one thousand nine hundred seven and two thousand and eight so what is happening to today's youth and what is behind the skyrocketing number of them being arrested to share some insight on this i spoke to a researcher and policy analyst at the justice policy institute amanda patter rudy since the study didn't provide many specifics i asked her what exactly are these young people being arrested for take a look. well you know it's hard to say we do know for example all of that there's been increasing the number of police in schools for example and there are a lot of young people in schools so for example between two between ninety seven in two thousand five hundred and thirty eight percent increase in plea. and we know that in some districts students have been arrested for very minor offenses things like disorderly contacts or very disorderly conduct so they can be contributing to the number of students or the reason that there's been so many young people

arrested over her course of the study and would you say that most of these crimes are violent or nonviolent and how many of them are drug related. but it's hard to say how many are drug related it is possible of that very little love all the drug offenses are driving some of the arrests from school that particular it will be very very minor thing if you see anything it's minor and swearing and it's you germ for example or just generally disrupting class didn't get arrested first swearing at a teacher yes you can absolutely school resource officer it may be called to a classroom and you can be arrested for disrupting class and that. and so do you think that the problem is that that the youth is growing more troubled or is the power or is it just that as you said earlier there is more police say of the schools and therefore more young people are getting arrested i do think that

there's more we think there's more of control of. what i think used to be you just thought i mean if you own behavior things that in the past you had done it's always been there probably would have been you know law enforcement the principal might have been calling it isn't it but certainly that. and so what does this have to say about the system our justice system that we're putting so many young people behind bars these days. i mean unfortunately i think that the justice system is being used as a last resort and rather you know relying on it first rather than last and we just saw home write you problems you know being frustrated i think is something that has happened generally generationally you know why. you're now you know the way many morning wondering ok. and. so we are seeing if we are seeing this crackdown i mean how does that benefit

our society to crack down and put more and more young people in jail unfortunately it doesn't you know by i arrest him kids by putting them in jail we're just connecting them from the very institutions that ensure their success so whether it's education which leads to a good job and general you know. i used to ensuring that might. be. ok so in addition to the crackdown what are some possible social our economic explanations for the rise in iraq or is that part of the picture. you know i mean it's hard to say i mean it's interesting. in the past that. point it might have something to do with an increase in crime rates but that's clearly not what's going on i think it's hard to say going on the fact that we are

starting intentionally using the justice system more than anybody to do. so it could be a lot of things but we know some of the policy response would be redirect our fund into parliament. and even treatment. also want to add because fairly recent statistics show that one in five kids live in poverty today and a lot of times a correlation can be drawn between poverty and then the type of environment that kids grow up in could this be part of the picture. why we don't know yet we can. ensuring that there are fewer children living in poverty no of course this isn't to say that people that are living in poverty are more likely to make. many things work to make sure. anyone is that the empowering of. all. showing that they are no longer living in. again.

and so well what needs to be done to reverse this to make it so that these rates aren't so high to keep our you know that out of handcuffs. you know first before i say big that we need to just scale back the number. of our rest of all the washington post. had this whole list of things you could be arrested for fishing without a license and you know not how to i mean why are places in those things might not necessarily have to do with younger in all these things that we could be potentially arrested for it just we need to just scale it back ok and lastly very quickly just want to ask you these numbers that are have just come out what does this say about the youth in the u.s. and maybe looking at the bigger picture about our nation well i think sort of generally. you know kids are and they're no different there's no change in

the way kids are eating and which is real danger to start you know a. generation you know even worse than the one for it. but again you know the best way. any i'm. going. to thank you for weighing in on this that was amanda. a researcher and policy analyst at the justice policy institute well that is going to wrap it up for now for more on the stories we covered head to our to dot com slash usa and check out our youtube page as youtube dot com slash r t america you can also follow me on twitter as well we'll be right back here in a half hour. wealthy

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