but when you go to the financial doctor as a christine legarde at the i.m.f. and they seem to be incompetent on this scale they seem completely oblivious to the reality of economics and finance what why either eg why don't why don't people why don't they just revolt i mean this is work in the past why don't people just revolt i why are they putting up with this that's a good question that's the million dollar question i mean i think that basically these people are just dressed in nice suits but they're empty suits they're just fools for the most part or there are people who are so craven in their need for political support and political opprobrium that they will do anything to keep happy the powers that be or the politicians at the ultimately have to respond to ok let's talk about spain's unemployment rate has recently jumped a twenty three percent suicide just soaring in greece these are the sort of conditions that you know we've seen before a lot america that leads to work dictatorships right is that in the cards now i think what we're going to see are populist politicians making hay from the current

economic downturn where you're going to see is for instance people like marie le pen really going out there and saying oh we don't need this you're all our problem started when we join the eurozone let's get out of the euro zone they're going to have those politicians in spain and italy and france they're all going to be saying that same tune and they are going to get political traction they're going to get the vote and who'll be scapegoated this time who will be scapegoated i think is going to be bankers and i think it's going to be politicians who are an emirate of the euro zone the one continent supercontinent idea i think those are the politicians who are going to suffer and the bankers i think are going to suffer if there is a populist politician who is able to transform people's discontent into votes right now we recently interviewed warren pollock and he said he believes that bank holidays are eminent what are your thoughts on this i don't think there's ever going to be any kind of bank holiday in the near term future i think it's fun to imagine oh a bank holiday and like they're all hell breaking loose and all the rest of it but it's not going to happen for a very simple reason any kind of big. call

a day in any country no matter how small greece portugal is going to be like a giant red flag and so the bottle and utilities are going to go after that particular country and everybody is going to panic a bank holiday would create more trouble and more panic then simply muddling along and having the e.c.b. continue with my position that was the argument for lehman brothers collapsed and the composition of lehman brothers is not far behind and ireland or portugal you know is roughly equivalent the same size it was a stomach lead to important and i'm going to collapse and yet because of some wrangling that was done in the boardrooms of these banks on wall street for a lot of personal reasons we find out later animosities between these guys they simply let lehman collapse and we had this huge collapse in two thousand and eight so that was a bit of a bank holiday for lehmann and bear stearns and and there was a credit seizure in these global markets it wasn't an official bank holiday but the global credit froze right now well but that's that's different right that's

basically you have a credit crunch is it going to happen again i actually don't think so because i think that these particular dogs have learned their lesson ben bernanke druggy respectively the head of the federal reserve and the e.c.b. the european central bank what they're going to do is they're going to put out as much liquidity as possible to prevent any kind of two thousand and eight liquidity crunch because that was the last quite a crisis that they know for instance at this point in time they are not afraid of inflation because they think oh inflation is so seventies we're over that so we have to worry about inflation we have to worry about liquidity crisis and so the next time we have a liquidity crisis we're going to have so much cash sloshing in the system that there is not going to be a two thousand eight situation but think they they can create inflation they would love to see some inflation sure they can't seem to create inflation for every trillion in fresh credit they force into this this is a dead duck of an economy there's another five. really and suddenly in losses on

banks' balance sheets that were not disclosed that more than cotton heated up about liquidity and it actually net net it's deflationary spiral continues unabated there is there's not there's no there's no way to stop this credit i'm not sure i'm not quite so sure look the situation and i agree with you that a lot of the losses sort of seem to sterilise a lot of the money printing going on but you do have to look at certain key commodities particular particularly copper. oil and gold no gold is reached historic highs against the euro we have oil up there over one hundred we have copper comfortably over three fifty so we're seeing that the possibility of inflation is not far away i would like in the situation to sort of like building a really big bonfire with a lot of dry tinder and throwing gasoline on it and you think well there's no fire but it only takes a single match once that match gets thrown in you know it's funny you know or to

the whole bonfire all right well there seems to be a bit of a split because the deflationary contraction that changing the global markets have repositioned gold from being a commodity to being a currency same thing for oil to a lot of agrees it's now currency and to some degree you could argue that maybe not so successfully with copper but so this is what's driving action in those markets versus some inflationary expectation but i want to switch gears for a second former war reporter chris hedges is suing the u.s. government over the n d a the national defense authorization act he believes the n b a the course but corporations and banks preparing for economic meltdown to which they are will need to deploy military on to the streets he's making this connection years thoughts. that they will ever deploy military on to the streets.

they already have i mean if you start looking in every american city you have. homeland security agents who are stopping people when they get out of trains you know to check to see if they have explosives which is sort of ridiculous i think that you know the possibility of the united states becoming a police state. it's we're already there so i don't exactly see what exactly the point is i think that chris hedges i respect him and i wish him the best of luck i think that he's just going to be spinning his wheels i think we saw here also is that its purpose as a preparatory act assuming that there is a revolution in america and the corporations who are going to be on the gallows this big they're taking the same d.n.a. as a way to authorize or make it easier for them to let's say hire mercenaries and blackwater arrest people for no cause this type of thing but i think it's a lack of education and the fact that we have such a credit education system in the united states sort of like paying off for a lot of people who want to you know cover over what's going on because in in more

educated populace the kinds of things the things that are going on in the united states would not be allowed but they are happening in the united states the n.d.a. you know this this issue with chicago that they're going to privatized their police force or something it's a dreadful despicable but people are just saying oh it's no big deal and i think what's happening is that people are thinking it's not going to affect me so why should i care now that is the end of a democracy when people start thinking and i think that's the point that has been reached in the united states that people say since it doesn't affect me why should i care oh my neighbor gets dragged away by blackwater's you know people maybe he must have done something so i'm just going nor it now when you travel around europe gonzalo over the past few weeks what are some of the economic differences you notice and what you see kind of in the u.s. i would you contrast it things are seem to me being here they seem to be better than the united states there is the low. of desperation that you're seeing in the

united states and the level of panic that you're seeing in the us which is really surprising the other thing that i'm noticing is that the people in europe recognize the crisis that they have but they seem to feel that oh they'll muddle along which i think is what most people think whenever they're in the middle of an economic crisis they don't think that this is the end of the world they figure that they'll muddle along and you know it'll get better just around the corner now whether that's true or not i hope it is but i don't think so i do think though that at this point in time it's looks like europe for all its problems over deadness and the problems of the eurozone seems to be in a lot better shape than the united states are so betting man would if you were to pick a country or two that you'd want to hang out during this global economic apocalypse what's at the head of the list. france i really low friends i mean i know that we're going to be at a fall in the food is great but i mean you know i could get your head you know into the game we're going to. talk to me more you know specifically about you know i

mean this is i think the smartest countries to go to at this point in time would be countries that you feel would be protected from a variety of threats that are currently in the air number one the environmental problems that we're having in the united states and so far as fracking is concerned the possibility of nuclear accidents in europe and japan and the united states again the problem the possibility or rather if not probability that in the united states are going to have severe capital controls and you already have capital controls in europe so i think that all of these would lead you to think that. probably the southern hemisphere is where you have to go now this other him as a mystery being south africa australia new zealand chile argentina you know what those seem to be the countries that would be the safest to go but the same time you have certain environmental problems that are going on in chile in so far as pollution and so on jago you also have a fairly strict control system they don't want money just fly in fly out of chile and so you have the possibility of that then in australia new zealand you have the

possibility that the australian and or new zealand government will wind up cooperating with the american government in terms of extraditions in terms of you know renditions stuff like that so each of them has pros and cons and you have to weigh them for yourself but it looks objectively like the southern hemisphere is where you want to go all right gonzalo lira thanks so much for being on the kaiser report thank you for having me all right not going to do it for this edition of the kaiser report with me max kaiser states that harbor are and i guess because all the . s p g dot com want to send me an e-mail pleased to report that our teeth are you you can follow me on twitter of course max kaiser and this is nice guys are saying . sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you. are.

three. any over for your media projects or a free media or john darche dot com you. just . see.

welcome to the lone a show where you get the real headlines with none of the mercy we're going to live out of washington d.c. now it's not going to speak with chris hedges about what he calls a cancer within the occupy movement he's referring to the black bloc then colonel lieutenant colonel daniel al davis is going to join us and tell us about a report he just admitted to congress and says the pentagon is intentionally misleading the public about the war in afghanistan and edward harrison will talk to us about what federal federal reserve chairman ben bernanke said on the hill today

we have all that and more for tonight including a dose of happy hour but first take a look at the mainstream media decided to miss. the last week we all saw the insane amount of money the outside groups have been pouring in to the campaign season in just the first four primary states documents show the outside groups spending on ads had risen sixteen hundred percent we also saw a g.o.p. centered super pacs were far away collecting more money than the left and so what you know looks like this made president obama have a change of heart as he's now signed off on a plan to dispatch cabinet officials senior advisers at the white house and top campaign staff members to deliver speeches at fund raising events for priorities usa that's the largest democratic super pac now this new policy the mainstream media all abuzz today. president obama is now giving the go ahead to wealthy

democratic donors to contribute to a super pac supporting him the obama campaign changing its position on super pacs in response to the massive amounts of money raised by those republican groups president obama makes a u.-turn deciding now for his team to help raise campaign cash for his super pac the president's campaign manager says look we cannot fight this campaign with one hand tied behind our back was this inevitable i think it was chris. all right so the question here that they ask is was this inevitable and like i never said we see said yes personally i'm not so sure on one hand this is a big flip flop and a cave on the part of the president not like we are used to seeing that happen by now but it's disconcerting nonetheless at the same time this is a sign of our political system and the problems within it right now there's so much money flooding in from the right that the democrats in obama's reelection campaign obviously felt that they have to play the game if they want to keep their jobs now

i'm going to get chris hedges take on this in our first interview tonight but before we do that let me just delve into one more point that i think needs to be made here do all the effects of citizens united are already drastic and yet really this is still just the beginning there is another way to handle this now this isn't the way that things have to be and so right now we see americans all across the country working fighting to get money out of politics we've seen a number of amendments brought up in congress to overturn this decision amendments that the president by the way said nothing about until today when his people signal that he supported that after caving and telling donors to contribute to priorities usa and we've also seen more than fifty local resolutions and cities to have citizens united overturn that's the right step if we really want the idea of a constitutional amendment to become a possibility has to start local now this is also a key element brought up by many of the occupy movement we've even seen a few members of the media out there the young turks and dylan ratigan launch initiatives of their own to undo the damage done by citizens united so at this

point it's no secret that there is a public battle that is going on. and if the mainstream media has seemed entirely oblivious to all of it they're happy to report on the figures when it comes to how much is being spent how many hundreds of super pacs there are who are some of the big time donors think the koch brothers and adelson the man with a single handedly funding newt gingrich's campaign but on the other front on the side of the opposition the mainstream media has been almost entirely silent now i say it again with the exception of dylan ratigan m.-s. of d.c. but somehow his colleagues have just left it to him to do on his own it's funny too considering that this is the same mainstream media that will often bring on extremes just to try and prove that they show both sides of every story often in a very misleading fashion but hey two people yelling at each other always makes good t.v. right so why is it now when they have figures and stats to talk about the impact of citizens united do they only talk about the president's capitulation and act like

that's just the way that it had to be there is a movement out there public opinion is not in support of the influence of money in our political system we see giving one person insane amounts of power we see transparently completely flying out the window so the people have realized that something is wrong but the mainstream media continues to live in an isolated bubble the only monitor is what's happening at the top echelons they've decided that these are the rules of the game and so those pretend from now on that it's just natural to play that way but so many people once which are amendment city council resolutions you name it that entire movement they've chosen to miss. all right so let's continue on with our discussion of outside movements wanting to change the landscape take the influence of money out of politics wake america up to the rampant inequality and corruption overturning citizens united is just one step for those that have been monitoring the occupy movement for over the last four

months you know that it's about much more but where does public opinion really stand on occupy now the majority of camps have been evicted even more so now that we've seen in some cities most notably oakland vandalism violence come into play and what's meant to be a peaceful movement our guest tonight specifically pinpoints the black bloc anarchists and calls them the cancer within occupy the destroy it so earlier i caught up with chris hedges columnist for truthdig and author of his latest book death of the liberal class i first asked him what he thought about the president's decision to send out his people and tell the donors to give away to super pacs. well he doesn't have any choice because the political system since citizens united in two thousand and ten has been rigged. if you step out of line these super pacs have the capacity to wipe you out. it was the death blow to american democracy it's a game obama has to play if he wants to retain political power and so he's playing

it well i think you could say that he's playing it from both sides as well right because now his aides are coming out saying it the president would support a constitutional amendment to get citizens united overturn but let's segue into the occupy movement right one of their things is also been getting the influence of money out of politics and yet you are writing about the black bloc and some of their tactics and call them a cancer within this movement can you elaborate why it is that you know you think that they're so detrimental. well because they alienate the mainstream i think you have to remember that the occupy movement if you look at all the polls articulate what the mainstream wants. nobody supports the bailouts the pfizer reform act the wars. the. continued failure to help homeowners that are underwater and losing their homes

this disastrous obamacare bill which. is going to force us to buy a defective product centrally you know two thousand pages written by corporate lobbyist so we have to look at the occupy movement as a mainstream movement now the prime mover behind wiping out the occupy encampments was of course a democratic administration and that's because they deeply fear this movement it is cold their bluff it has exposed them as corporate puppets in this two party corporate doggedly. i think that they realize that spite the efforts by move on dot org and van jones and others that they are not going to co-opt this movement and so on the one hand they will try to physically erase it we just had the d.c. encampment shutdown and internally they will try and divide it we have to look back into the movements of the one nine hundred sixty s. to see how divisive. internal security apparatus in the united states can be

there's no doubt that that's happening here and the fastest way to alienate the movement from the mainstream is to paint it as violent destructive of property. and our kids stick in the worst sense of anarchism which is kind of chaotic random attacks against targets spontaneous attacks and so the occupy movement is going to have to draw some very. sharp lines. it's got to stop these block block groups from essential be using them as human shields because remember there are tiny of these groups but they enter these large demonstrations and then use them as a kind of cover to carry out violent activities we've seen it not only in oakland but in denver los angeles in new york. antagonizing and confronting the police

because this is in essence a mainstream movement this is a movement that expresses the will of the mainstream it can't afford illian a the mainstream and i have no evidence that there are tours but if there are provoke a tours within this movement i'd bet pretty good money there within the black bloc and even if they are not they are certainly serving the interests of the one percent and you know this is a movement that wants inclusive a-t. and tolerance and a wide variety of opinions but it's got to draw the line on groups that essentially sabotage the work of this mass movement in the black bloc is the most egregious example of why i guess i'm wondering if that was inevitable if it any point if there was going to be some kind of a large movement specifically one that really started out on the streets of people physically camping that at some point there would. be become more difficult to keep

it nonviolent to keep it peaceful and i also i'm curious to do you think the occupy wall street was always a mainstream movement or you only think that now four and a half months in that's something that you can call it. no i think the reason that it resonated across the country is because it articulated the concerns of the mainstream which are not being articulated either by the corporate media or the political candidates who have descended into that and it is an absurdity these change the narrative remember before the rise of occupy we were talking about a deficit crisis with the rise of occupy we began to talk about inequality we began to talk about corporate criminality we began to talk about how unfair the american political and economic system is it it reverberated across the country and the power elite and i think in particular the democratic party was terrified

because if it could not co-opt this movement it had the potential to certainly restructure not only the debate but ultimately if it grew very configurations of power and so we shouldn't be surprised that there have been drug kone and forms used to try and wipe these movements out and that has been manifested by the ariston of these encampments but you can be sure they're working internally just to suggest lee is they have been working externally to get rid of occupy and so in that sense is it really a lot about public opinion if let's say there are more black people the end up showing up at more occupy rallies and you know what we constantly see reported on by local government officials and the authorities or you can even say by the media are some of these more violent tactics are cases of vandalism is the movement dead if that's the perception that gets put out there consistently. yeah i mean let's i

think a good sort of template for what we don't want to be is how we're portrayed and if you look at how for instance in the days and weeks before the encampment in zuccotti park in new york was shut down if you read the new york post there were portrayed as drug addicts vandals anarchists radicals they the authorities attempted to paint the movement with exactly these kinds of attributes and that's a pretty good example of what we don't want to be we don't want to play into their hands and the black bloc which are you know primarily why i sort of neal is stick. destructive embrace in sort of confusing petty vandalism in this repellent sort of cynicism with revolution. there are

exactly they conform to the stereotype that the enemies of the movement would like and that's a pretty good window into why they have to be separated from the movement if they were if they really were about confronting the police and confronting corporate power they wouldn't be using the movement to hide behind they would be going out striking out on their own to go after these targets and i think that's because ultimately and if you look at sort of radical block block area logs it's pretty clear that they are an enemy of everything this movement stands for and in particular nonviolence i want to switch gears really quick chris it's been a while since they've gone to catch up with you and you actually filed a lawsuit against the u.s. government because of the n.d.a. that was passed right that included that provision that allowed for the definitely

military detention of american citizens and so i want. hear more of your reasoning as to why it is that you follow the file this lawsuit i think you like many others of us out there find this to be incredibly scary and unconstitutional and egregious and bridge the fence on our civil liberties but at the same time the obama administration while they don't like this being handed over into military control they were already doing many of these things throughout the you from within the executive branch. yes that's correct under the two thousand and one authorization to use military force act many of these activities were already being carried out including the detention of american citizens without due process that's what happened to jose padilla who was reputed to be one of the hijackers the did make a plane held for three and a half years in a military brig without due process it was under the two thousand and one act that the obama administration felt that it could serve as judge jury and executioner and

order the assassination of a u.s. citizen on warlock e. in yemen. so yes but this is a radical interpretation of the two thousand and one act what we see with the national defense authorization act is the codification of this radical assault against basic civil liberties unambiguous li being placed in the u.s. law so not only can the u.s. military sensually it carry out extraordinary rendition on u.s. streets holding american citizens who are deemed to be terrorists or with associated groups i mean there's a lot of very sort of frightening leave vague language in there but then there are in the language of the bill held until the end of hostilities whenever that is this overturns two hundred years of domestic law. and it is in the hands of the state and utterly terrifying weapon the obama administration

has been very disingenuous it issued a signing statement saying that they would not use it against american citizens and yet we should remember that nancy nancy pelosi dianne feinstein proposed legislation or or passage to be inserted into the legislation that would exempt u.s. citizens and this was rejected by the obama white house and rejected by the democratic party all of the struggles over the wording of the bill with carl levin's office it was co-sponsored by karl. on a democrat and john mccain a republican was over who would decide which american citizens would be swept up in the military dragnet and denied due process and which would be granted exemptions who would have that power the obama white house wanted that power for themselves they got it and once they got it they signed the bill into law but it was never a discussion over whether or not americans should be stripped of due process so these are not the kinds of tools we want to hand.