there are something like eighty million gun owners in our country but the n.r.a. is driven by these gun crusaders he's really hard work in the business gloomier and they're able to create the agenda the real american citizens are the biggest celebration of american values that the n.r.a. is able to recruit intensely committed members because they're framing gun rights or threats to gun rights in a way that makes them feel like all their rights are threatened are you proud of your country and want to stay in school or was are you how do you read it i thought we was america and we. thank you very much for thirty five francs thank you. their target audience is conservative white gun owning men and they feel pain and they feel sort of displaced in our society i've been fired

up since the last election i got enough change already and again only more if they're losing the country to others they feel like the minority they feel like you know immigrants and lesbians people of color are taking over the country and these conservative whites are now the numerical minority so they're going to act offers a message that not only are going to being taken away but so are your core beliefs your identity your values your status your power is that correct my interpretation of what you said is that the right to insurrection against the drug is a god given right that you're protecting you sure that is correct. our founders did they have this political propaganda that essentially the federal government is depriving americans of their free and that they are resistance there shouldn't be any federal gun control or the federal government has no authority should be no federal jails there should not be a you know lifting i just out. this is

a movie that has potential radical if not revolutionary. intentions self-defense is a benefit of being able to shoot the government. that's why we have a second amendment that's what we did with it we shut the government when the government broke the contract with the american colonies we shot up and we pushed him out the issue i call this the insurrectionists theory of the second. and it's very dangerous it is an idea that is a threat to the very foundations of our democracy it's a foul it's a threat to the rule of law itself it's an invitation to vigilanteism it's an invitation to take up arms literally against public officials if you don't like what they're doing. if you have any doubt about how dangerous that is reflecting back on the oklahoma city bombing. it is

a devastation and on certainty in a small city that has never before be touched by terrorism timothy mcveigh nine it was an individual who absorbed this. ideology and he acted it out he concluded that the time for revolution had come. to the federal building. and he knew that one of the agencies in that building was the bureau of alcohol tobacco and fire which was the government agency that he thought would be the one to come for the guns in ohio citizen soldiers trained for combat while snipers in michigan practice with high powered weapons. this insurrectionist idea which is also what motivates these militia groups formed back in the ninety's and reforming again a report out today claims fifty new militia training and sprung up in less than two years as one law enforcement source dangerous. next is brutal at all because it has

a spark. the founders were very clear about this it wasn't for honey that we have the second amendment they fear they fear big government and that is why the people should be armed it doesn't mean that we're agitating for the use of these arms but it always holds government in check we can't continue expanding the domestic and title and system so the time will come hopefully we will never have to use the weapons for self defense but we should be prepared but the most important thing that we do is to understand the importance of defending liberty so that we can preserve the greatness of this country i thank you very much.

the rest of the world has figured out that they can do something about gun violence other countries have taken steps to license guns to register guns require training i'm not saying all those are things that should be done here necessarily but there are things that we can do. since we don't think bad guys should have guns we should do background checks and find out if those who are buying guns are bad guys or not we do that for some sales we don't do it for all of them we should do it for all of them it's just that simple. if you stop selling guns to. a strong sales one of the most common ways they've got to get into the hands of criminals why would the congress give foresman the resources to do undercover inspections if thirty percent of the trafficking cases are connected to gun shows why would you call. the control loop. the way it works here is that congress is so

afraid of everything else the n.r.a. can do to them that they will make the simple gesture to make all of us sick so you've got to try to find the middle ground in the gun show loophole is the thing that the public really ought to get. your camera you should use if you think this bill has any chance i mean these areas opposes this saddest story victorious in the supreme court here on capitol hill it killed d.c. voting rights i mean it's a first to be going up against this so this is this is really bad today. they venture at a high. background check. no background check right. because. i the fact is congressman i wouldn't be sitting here in front of you today if one for the events that happened i did my sixteenth two thousand and seven immersion in

tech i wouldn't be sitting here in front of you today if it wasn't for the ten minutes of hell that i survived on that day and i wouldn't be sitting here in front of you today if our federal gun laws had been stronger the existing brady act as it is written is too weak to protect future americans from up from another summary cho or other predator purchasers i can think of no reasonable responsible logical reason why that should be the fact is congressman i wouldn't be sitting here in front of you today if i didn't believe with every part of me that might like that officials will do what is responsible and reasonable to protect their citizens. thank you very much for your time mr goddard i'd just like to say that your testimony is compelling is a testimony i've heard here on the hill i would hope that all members of congress could hear that could make a big difference namely that this particular issue so i want to thank all of our witnesses today for most conclude. thank you there's still another college

campus shooting this time northern illinois university in dekalb in them am at northern illinois is the fifth shooting at public schools and colleges in just one week what's it going to take when columbine happened people thought if coal mines not enough nothing's enough well columbine wasn't enough a couple of years ago there was a whole string of shootings on campus virginia tech certainly most horrifically and people said if this isn't enough nothing's enough old virginia tech wasn't enough not even in virginia let alone a federal law so i frankly don't know what's. download

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mark your calendars because leon panetta is ready to close the book on the war in afghanistan but as the u.s. gets ready for the next chapter what has really changed and is there any way for the u.s. military to save face well read between the lines. and while the military quietly pushes the polls the escape hatch hillary clinton is closing the door on syrian president bashar al assad and even bullying the u.n. into intervention we'll bring you the very latest from the from the security council meeting. there with the president of the effective thank you stan stan i'm going to say you know i don't know. guess the peaceful country of beki beki beki

stan but herman cain isn't the only one who needs to brush up on his geography u.s. politicians can't seem to stop making foreign policy blunders so are all these folks costing us our credibility abroad. and while politicians land themselves in hot water it looks like the rest of us are in for a few more weeks of cold this according to the resident weather expert the groundhog but there is more than one groundhog popping it's head up in washington d.c. these days i'll explain. it's thursday february second eight pm in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t. well we begin this hour with the crisis in

syria the death toll in syria has surpassed five thousand as the violence rages on between government forces and rebel fighters and so day a debate at the u.n. security council continues over what to do about the conflict the west calling on syria president bashar al assad. not to step down but russia and china say they will veto the resolution because they say it paves the way for the west to intervene militarily russia and china says regime change is not their business artie's on the stasi joins us live now from our studio in new york hi there on the stasi i understand that there are some new developments are they any closer to coming to an agreement. well liz i have to see quite a bit of a guessing game really is continuing to come out of the security council a lot of contradictory statements being made by certain delegates so it's hard to tell exactly what stages the developments at the u.n. are out what we do know for certain is that some sort of new details have been put

on paper that members of the security council are sending over to their governments for deliberation and approval which means that if whatever has been put on paper is approved by governments of the security council members it is very likely that a vote will come quiet sood now russia's ambassador to the u.n. however has said that regardless of this having taken place of this piece of the papers being sent out this does not make any precondition and ensure any sort of results too quickly so what we are hearing is that one of the things that are possible reportedly the clause calling for the syrian leader to step down within fifteen days or face quote further measures as well as reportedly the arms embargo have been put off the table these are key elements that russia and china have been opposing so we're going to have to wait and see what comes tomorrow it is going to be key because members will be getting back together again to decide after having discussed developments with their governments so it looks like there is compromise

or some kind of negotiations taking place some kind of progress that are allowing the two parties to come face to face. this absolutely absolutely liz definitely i mean today's negotiations we just were waiting for four hours of closed door negotiations along as we know that since tuesday talks have really been nonstop and the key is that although the security council started with these completely contradicting opinions one side calling for regime change and russia and china completely opposing this we do have to say that everybody has been. this entire time that a consensus is what they are all looking for nobody is really looking to put a resolution on the table that any other member would veto what they do want is a joint message however exactly what the joint message is going to be we're going to have to wait and see once this new document is made public interesting new developments there also bring attention to what secretary of state hillary clinton

said yesterday kind of this divisive language she said quote every member of the council has a has to make a decision whose side are you on are you on the side of the syrian people or are you on the side of a brutal dick tauriel regime so on a saucer what do you make of this claim and they're painting this as black or white you're either on the good side or on the side of evil. well you know liz i think i mean first of all this kind of language has been somewhat traditional for us diplomacy especially in bush years where it's either you're with us the good guy or the bad guy so you know no surprises there but i do have to say that it looks a little bit like the u.s. leading up to these negotiations kind of bit off more than they could chew because they came along with this very tough stance supporting the arab league documents saying regime change arms embargo and so on and the u.s. knew perfectly all along for months and months this syrian crisis has been going on

for ten months now that russia would never back these radical measures because what russia believes in is sovereignty so you know some harsh statements were definitely made some division military trying to split up opinions at the security council but right now definitely people are working together because of this language is not really going to find any solutions to the crisis and. in light of this new information any idea how soon there will be a resolution and how soon there will be a vote on it. well liz with old kinds of difference for different reports coming out of the united nations right now it's kind of hard to say we have been waiting for something to happen these last couple of days it is possible that a vote could come as soon as tomorrow it's also possible that the security council might wait until monday because there is a conference going on in munich where some discussions of foreign ministers further

talks could take place so we're really going to have to wait and see there's really no knowing here i don't think the diplomats themselves know how soon some sort of vote will come in the next days to come but on the south they are you know that you know china russia they were they're concerned about language and attacks that could lead to regime change and they're saying that that is not what they are in the business of doing and they also fear that this could lead to another scenario another i guess another libya any discussion of that. to ensure that that this doesn't happen again that we don't see another gone like that certainly yes yes of course liz i mean that's one of the one of the key things of course that russia and china like you say have been saying all along is that they don't want a repeat of the libyan scenario because we have to keep in mind some sort of negotiations leading up to resolutions can be about one thing but like we saw in the libyan scenario after no fly zone was was passed

a no fly no fly zone resolution what ended up happening is a full blown military intervention even though certainly diplomats were trying to convince each other at the security council that this would not be the case so of course you know this these are all these concerns still exist and that's exactly why they're trying to hammer out a deal and this is exactly why sometimes it takes so long for these resolutions to be passed is because literally every single word in the document needs to be weighed out because it could be interpreted in one way or another it's very complicated legal stuff and they're certainly trying to make sure that every possible further scenario is included in whatever document they prove on a saucy i thank you for keeping a close eye on the develop this developing story that was our correspondent on the south. well the ends of an era on the horizon in afghanistan u.s. secretary of defense leon panetta has announced that america's longest war is coming to an end by next year the u.s.

and nato aims to draw down troops and then combat in afghanistan now it wasn't too long ago that americans watched as u.s. troops and tanks rolled out of iraq but after their exit iraq remains in a state of instability and violence as insurgents fights again a stronghold in the country now in transition and the last time the u.s. ended a war without a decisive victory it was in vietnam back in one nine hundred seventy five during the fall of saigon it marked an end to an extremely unpopular war the capital of south vietnam fell to the communist north two americans were killed thousands fled the u.s. embassy it was the single largest helicopter evacuation in history well this may be exactly what the u.s. is trying to avoid as they plan their departure from afghanistan the way the u.s. leaves afghanistan has the potential to define the entire war and with the official end of the war we want to take

a look back at what this all means and what has actually been accomplished with thousands dead billions of dollars spent was a decade of bloodshed and war all for nothing i pose this question to dare crow political director for brave new foundation take a listen. the investment of lives and resources in the military for strategy was absolutely a ways we said prior to president obama's latest escalations in afghanistan that you know more troops are not going to solve the problem that if you added more troops you would in increasing the temperature of the conflict to more civilians have become the crossfire and that's exactly what happened so the answer is yes i mean that military for a strategy has been a waste and if you heard about the recent nato report that was leaked that showed the taliban's self concept is still very strong you'll see that that military first policy has failed to achieve victory and it was always going to fail to achieve victory the right moves would have been political solutions that would have brought

all the stakeholders in afghanistan to the table and elected a government through legitimate means that would have represented the will people there now with this impending drawdown of the troops and as the us reflect from the time spent in afghanistan what was really accomplished fact. i think it's i think that at least now to report really shows that we're going to have a very hard time pointing to any lasting impact on the afghanistan political process especially if we keep supporting corrupt national and corrupt local leaders like ahmed karzai is family members people like karl rove seek people that we know to be corrupt know to be war criminals but we arm them anyway simply because they were enemies of the taliban now if we want to have a lasting impact in afghanistan you know we can support things like election reform like supporting people who are advocating for the rights of women in afghanistan but doing that with guns is absolutely not the right policy against what has been done to car taliban influence in the rio grande or has there are influence in the

region waned at all. well i think part of the problem in our attempts to get them to the negotiation table is the united states has been successful at killing senior leaders of taliban membership but those are just replaced from the bottom and the negative impact that that actually has had is brought to our more radical younger leaders in the taliban that actually are less willing to negotiate an end to the war i mean let's be honest based on what we've seen military force is not going to force an end to the conflict with the taliban in afghanistan are only options were always political discussions and our military first policy is radicalize that faction even more and brought to power people who are less willing to negotiate and are more repressive on the rights of women so i think it's a fair assessment to say that the more we've relied on military solutions in afghanistan the worse the situation has got in the further we are from lasting gains in that region. and as you just mentioned this highly classified report that

was leaked shows that the taliban backed by pakistan will rise back to power the u.s. has been trying to form some kind of an alliance with pakistan and hopes that they can help and fighting terrorism but in light of this report is any kind of constructive relationship with pakistan now unlikely. well i think it's not quite fair to say that the taliban would return to power the same way that they were in power before the us bays and it's not going to be that cut and dry it will be a very ambiguous relationship as to who is in power using control the thing that's fair to say is that it's not going to be possible through military force to eliminate the taliban as a political force in the life of afghanistan and the longer we put off into real good faith negotiations with our opponents in this conflict the longer we're going to make sure that that conflict is settled by force of arms now what we've said in other pieces that we put out has been that the people in the regions where the insurgency is the strongest what they said they want is

a just election process that doesn't blacklist people based on which side of the conflict that they're on but which blacklists them or less them on the ballot based on their record of human rights and respect for the people of afghanistan right now their standards are very unjust if you're an ally of the united states or of kabul you can get away with much much more without being blacklisted not just helps promote petty thugs and local warlords as leaders in afghanistan what those people want is a fair process that keeps the worst people out from both sides of the conflict and then allows a new election process with fair rules that allows people from all sides of the conflict to put their name on the ballot and now we have we heard this news from the secretary of defense leon panetta that this drawdown is going to happen by the end of next year is there a graceful way for the u.s. to exit the country well let's be clear about what's on the table nobody in the bush or excuse me in the obama administration has said that there's going to be a date certain for all troops to be out of afghanistan what they have said is

they're kind of speeding up the process and by two thousand and thirteen they'll be handing off combat operations to the afghans locally doubt if that follows the path that followed in iraq what will start is a withdrawal of u.s. forces kind of out of the faces of the local people in their villages and on to more they structures where they are on large bases instead of out in. communities all the time and from there would then further withdraw out of the country now if it's fire is what it's going to be like on the way out let's not let's not paint too rosy a picture here it will be more unstable but the simple fact is that adding more troops in afghanistan did not bring down the level of violence in fact it helped escalate and staying there for another ten years and wasting two billion dollars a week is not in the interest of the american people when there's no victory in sight or even on the table as a definition so the the way out is to simply begin pulling the troops out to support more fair like subprocesses in afghanistan and two if we're trying to avoid

another vietnam let's avoid fighting wars using the exact same strategies that got us in the mess in vietnam in the first place now this news and is coming after troops have been pulled out of iraq so now these two both of these wars are kind of coming to a close gradually how would you compare the two and the legacy that the us has had left behind in these countries. i would say that both wars utilized exactly the same kind of overarching military strategy that we saw in vietnam and because of that both wars have not only damaged our reputation in the world in general but specifically in the region and that what we should learn from this experience is that standing hundreds of thousands of troops in other people's countries to try to remake societies you know motivated through national hubris it's absolutely either not a way to make americans safer nor a wise use of our resources abroad and what we can learn from these two conflicts

is that you know the most important thing that americans can do is regard their there the arguments made for war and more troops from leaders with skepticism and work really hard as folks at work to united states in those words possible there thanks for weighing in and giving us your perspective that was political director for brave new foundation there a crowd thank you well campaign seasons and full swing of g.o.p. presidential candidates now hone in on nevada with a caucus coming up there this weekend and from and bear acing debate performances to be will during interviews when it comes to foreign policy it seems some of the candidates don't really know what's going on abroad this as one of these men quite possibly could be the next commander in chief of the world's most powerful country are the correspondent kareen apart and i explores how these binders by past and present u.s. leaders could be affecting america's image abroad.