state especially in times of turmoil and instability i just want to ask you one last question here to switching gears in regards to the situation in syria and the increasing violence that we see the u.n. security council vote that russia and china vetoed and we saw the russian foreign minister today go and meet with assad what do you think should be done here do you think the international community should intervene you know do you think that there are the people are worried of this might turn out like libya and it will be it in the military intervention no i don't support intervention and i didn't support intervention in libya beyond stopping that armored column from going into benghazi . you have to remember that. you know it's in a similar situation with libya where you have an owl white minority that still stands firmly behind the assad regime so you're talking about a couple million at least syrians who remain loyal. it is unfortunately

descending into a civil war i do support sanctions but not intervention all right chris i want to thank you so much for joining us tonight. thank you. five just ahead on so we all know there's a lot of spin the goes in selling the war in afghanistan after the break we'll speak with one soldier the just released a report to congress. that. same . people calling what you said for free and fair elections. and we're still reporting from the summer as you can hear behind me loud explosions. i mean.

you know how 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 thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harvey welcome to the big picture.

we often talk about the difference between the pentagon spin on the war in afghanistan and the council we hear from veterans from journalists from human rights activists and state department workers generals and the secretary of defense will talk about progress and momentum while downplaying statistics that show increases of violence and record breaking troop deaths and so now the war is winding down now that leon panetta has announced that troops will end their combat mission in the middle of two thousand and thirteen you can bet that the obama administration is going to attempt to spin this as a success but one man is just a bit of a classified report to members of congress arguing the department of defense has

intentionally and consistently misled the american people and congress when it comes to measuring progress and conduct and what is now america's longest war tenet colonel daniel davis has also written an eighty six page unclassified version which the d.o.d. has not yet allowed to be released to the public so he joins us tonight to give us more details here to discuss this with me is daniel davis u.s. army lieutenant colonel and matthew hoh senior fellow at the center for international policy gentlemen thank you so much for joining us tonight daniel i want to start with you or danny and please just tell me why it is that you even wrote a report like this where you were you assigned to something or just after seeing so much experiencing so much you felt the need that you had a story to tell it was the letter i had to do the job that i had there was required me to travel all over the country to talk to soldiers at every level from the highest commander to the lowest done to your old private. and what our soil there

over time especially was beginning to be clear was so different than what the public assertions or that i started to have. problems with it but that turned into something more when i started seeing the of the results of men die as a result of this in missions that. made no sense and were then later characterized as big successes going fact they were not in later in the summer a couple of guys in particular that i had met. were killed in action a couple of weeks later and it drives home pretty strong toward the end of summer so i know that for now this is still classified that has been allowed or they haven't been able to release this eighty six page version that has to be has not classified yet is just not been really it's not been released yet but how much how much can you tell us you know you wrote an article a couple of pages today a couple anecdotes so what is it that really you want to share that you can for now with the public well the things that i can share our you know my personal experiences and you know i was able to see you know how the afghan security forces

how they perform on combat patrols dismantle drills mounted patrols virtually everywhere that i went to so i could see with my own eyes and then i also interviewed literally hundreds of soldiers to see their perspective as well and times that i couldn't see and i saw a very consistent picture everywhere that the afghan security forces are very incapable they display very little desire to be capable and the people of afghanistan after you know now into the eleventh year of war show no inclination to have any desire to be connected with their government and to support their you know the afghan security forces at the expense of the taliban you just don't see that happening anywhere and those are the very pillars of the opportunity of the ability to have a success in a war like this map they have you seen the unclassified version i've seen the classified report i have not seen the classified report. i don't want to go into specifics i don't want danny to get into any trouble of course but it's a collection of his observations it's a collection of

a lot of publicly available data that backs up his conclusions you know and this is cooperated by reports we hear that the national intelligence estimate on afghanistan is saying the wars in the stalemate that we're not achieving our objectives it goes into other information we hear from these leaked reports coming out of kabul that the taliban feel they are winning that we are not having success that's going to last on the battlefield as well as just the. you know any of the media reports you can read you know last week the usa today reported that i.e.d. attacks and revise explosive device attacks were ten percent higher than they were the previous year i mean they want sixteen thousand idea tax against our troops in two thousand that's forty five times a day they have lost a tax a record ok i think the numbers from two thousand and one to two thousand and nine they only lost sixteen thousand i taxi in march as many last year as they didn't previous from two thousand and one two thousand and nine so how can you argue that

we're we stop the momentum when they're able to carry out that many attacks and that's true across the board for whatever metric you want to look at well so to me one of the key ones very category is when you look from the twenty four months before the surge started as measured by one january two thousand and ten as you know in the summer of two thousand general mcchrystal says you know man this this mission is in danger of failing because all this stuff of the casualties and violence and now we've got a surge one when you measure the u.s. casualties killed or wounded it was about three thousand four hundred and some odd beth about four hundred killed in the rest wounded if you measure the twenty four months after that it's eleven thousand in something in nine hundred some odd killed so how can you say it's really just that these numbers are out there so why is it that you felt the need to write a report and to submit it to congress do you think we're being duped by the generals you know let's face it our generals these days are pretty media savvy. there's an entire spin machine working over at the pentagon there is kind of

a cup here. and here's why you see the reports all the time you see that this is a cup of water or at least that's what you think it is but i'm telling you this is actually a chalice a fine crystal shallots is a wine is a matter of fact and you look at this and you know it's a blue cup of water no no i've been making challenges for thirty some years i've been a combat veteran and i'm telling you this is the shallows and so we tell members of . that despite what you see with these statistics despite what the spot with these leaked reports have said. that he mentioned it all those things are very clear that a normal person using common sense would say every one of these are clear indicators that you're not succeeding but every single one of those has this machine that you're talking about so you have actually that's a positive thing somehow that works out to our advantage and for some reason i guess people think well i mean he's been making you know crystal shells for a long time so i mean looks like a blue cup of water to me but maybe it is

a shot like maybe you're letting members of congress off a little bit there are a lot of people in there that will also have served there a lot of people that have been to iraq been to afghanistan of course the tour that they get is something that is highly controlled. but at the same time you know for the purposes of politics do they just let it keep going we talk about how nobody wants to be soft on defense or soft on terror i mean that's something make an answer but i've been very clear talking about what i have personally done personally experienced and to me whether congress is doing that or not i mean they can someone else can decide that but i'm talking about the guys that i'm part of you know i'm a part of the u.s. army the army you know i love the army seven values that we live in what not and what kills me is that the guys who are making decisions and not square with either congress or with the american people that's got to change so that when congress at least has a chance or the president has a chance to make decisions or the american people have a chance to support or nonsupport on something that's accurate and not this

constant spin where they're like i don't know i mean they say this but it looks wrong but they say it's right so it puts you in a dilemma why are they getting away with it isn't it their responsibility if they're going to be asking us to put the bill if they're going to be asking people to sacrifice their lives to be honest about what a war is yeah absolutely it's a responsibility they're constantly constantly charge to do so however there is a lot of elements of this one the american people are calling their offices and asking to get for them be concerned about gaston so if you're a polyp. the best thing to do probably say nothing stick your neck out there but the other part of to is there's we've lost sight of what the line is between respect for what respect is for the military and what deference is towards the military and so what happens if you go to a senate armed services committee hearing or you go to a house armed services committee hearing all you see are heads nodding up and down agreement with the generals and so i think what you question is what we've become a society that we're able to send kids overseas have them killed and do the killing

and ask the hard questions to break. and at home we'll be right back. people calling. for free and fair elections. and they're still reporting from the land as you can hear behind me.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else some other part of it and realized everything you thought you don't know i'm sorry as if.

i were back for a few more minutes with daniel davis u.s. army lieutenant colonel and matthew hoh senior fellow at the center for international policy all right gentlemen we're talking about this report that you have given over to congress that it's classified for now the unclassified version the d.o.d. hasn't released but something that could be kind of a risky thing if you're saying that the pentagon is lying to the american people they are lying to congress and so i'm just wondering if you think that there's going to be a backlash and wondering if anyone has already attacked you already said that you are putting national security at risk or being traitor well i got to say so for you know i got it from the iraq also got to give credit in so for the senior leaders in my chain of command in particular has said nothing bad is going to happen to you because of this you're not going. b. you know your clearances are going to take away your continue to do your job every

day so so far everything's been good to go now whether that continues on you know after shows like this come out and what not is going to be another matter but so far they don't forget that what you are get. worried for danny i mean he's putting his career on the line it's not like he will retire next week i mean he's got a few more years of service left and we have seen you know over break you brought thomas drake who was the n.s.a. employee who blew the whistle and they persecuted him for years thomas tamm the justice department lawyer who blew the whistle on the warrants wiretapping he was he had to undergo an investigation that took four five years you know so i'm afraid a same thing happen to danny were because he provided classified information the congress which is his right to do so and he followed all the regulations it's easy to start a witch hunt it's easy to investigate him to make sure he crossed all the t.'s and dotted all the i's and some afraid he's going to suffer what a lot of guys france gale the guy who who got us the m.

raps in iraq who got the vehicles that we need in iraq buck the system he went through years and years of best occasions when he did the right thing so this is the knowing of knowing that these are risks you know why did why did you do it and there's a certain way this war needs to be remembered there's no question it's not about that it's about could not morally allow myself to just say you know what don't say anything just finish out your career quietly and no problem knowing that there are men to go outside the wire every day who don't get that opportunity and they're going to risk their laugh every day to do the very best they can to accomplish this mission and i think that we owe them to tell the truth about what's going on so that we sent him out there it better be for a darn good know what is the truth there is no mission accomplished no there is not it's it's almost flat land there's been no progress i mean in all the things you can measure since the start surge started it's either worse or the same but nothing is better and i got to wrap it up and thank you both so much for joining us tonight thank you very much.

hi guys it's time for show and tell on tonight's program the last time we spoke about the plan troop withdraw in afghanistan we asked you why you think the u.s. chose to announce of the combat mission in afghanistan would end a full year before was originally planned to go to producer patrice and sent you to find out what you had to say. the u.s. announce will be which are going a substantial number of troops from afghanistan by spring of two thousand and thirteen a full year ahead of schedule leaving behind a lot of questions are the afghan troops really ready to take on security alone is it another sign that the nato alliance is cracking or that president obama is just cracking under election year pressure well we asked our viewers why they thought the u.s. chose to announce the combat in the combat mission in afghanistan would end up a full year before his plan to hold miles said it's because it's an election year

the president has promised to bring american forces home from afghanistan chris carol agreed saying it is obama running scared of the polls it's time to buy some popularity but other people think it's much more serious than just politics i don't you brown who said it is because troops are going to be needed somewhere else soon maybe iran or even the pacific region loni said more specifically it is because a war with iran will come a full year earlier them planned and whatever the reason a large withdrawal of u.s. combat troops from afghanistan is a step in the right direction for so many lives lost and billions spent with no signs of success in sight i would draw it may be the only tool left in the u.s. arsenal. thousand always we appreciate your responses and here's our next question for you during the show we spoke to chris hedges about the effect of the black a block on the wall street occupy wall street movement so do you think that they are a cancer as hedges described let us know you think on facebook twitter and you tube and it goes your response just might make it on air. federal reserve chairman ben

bernanke he testified again on capitol hill today telling the senate banking committee that there is a still a long way to go before labor markets can be said to be operating normally as he said earlier this week despite what was a thought what was thought of as a positive jobs report for the month of january where the official unemployment rate fell to eight point three percent and the economy added two hundred forty thousand jobs the unusually high level of long term unemployment is what remains particularly troubling and we've also heard a chorus of conservative commentators this week saying that the b.l.s. numbers are fake misleading or fox news even posited that the obama administration is cooking the books but in reality so everybody just waking up to the figures that have been there all along joining me to discuss it is edward harrison founder of the web site credit write downs dot com thanks so much for joining us tonight to be here so ironically on capitol hill again basically what he said earlier this week is that the progress is frustratingly slow when it comes to the economy now is

saying it's going to take a long time to get back to normal so we really need ben bernanke to tell us that i think that stuff is kind of obvious and if you're going to have the chairman of the federal reserve come to capitol hill i want to hear a little more you do want to hear more but what more can you say because it's the same story that we've had for a long time but you know. the numbers being cooked and so forth oh well we'll get into that will you know that when one second but so you think that even he can't say more because because everything is just so uncertain definitely you know there's also the extra europe you know we're in a global synchronized growth slowdown i call it which is meaning that you know things were doing ok in the summer but then growth slowed you see slowdowns in places like china india and brazil but you also see it definitely in europe europe's in a double dip recession right now so really it's not just the united states it's having the problem it's a global problem and so any of those things can affect what happen. in the us what

do you say about figure that came out saying that in december consumer credit went up by nineteen billion i mean that's that's kind of insane right that just means americans are taking on a lot more debt. i think so it's a one off i think that in general if the economy is not sinking people will take on debt what you really have to be thinking about is mortgage debt whether or not you know the credit will expand as a result of people being able to buy homes and whether you know house prices are going up i'm not really that concerned about you know credit actually increasing at this point because you know the united states has been the leader in terms of deliberate in the household sector if you look across all of the countries that have had a very difficult time in the developed economy from a housing bust the united states is leading in terms of the percentage decline in consumer credit all right so you're not concerned about that but there are a lot of people that are really concerned about these b.l.s.

numbers that come out every month and so what's your take i mean you see every news channel out there report every single month on the thinkers that come out and my constant beef with them is that they don't talk about the you six right there they rarely ring up the underemployed those that are marginally attached they just give you this official number but suddenly we hear this chorus of conservative commentators i guess a remembering of the you six exists but not even only that they're going further and saying that these numbers are straight up fake. i mean that's completely partisan the reality is that their use six is a great number because. we've had a systemically declining unemployment rate because they've been changing the way that the unemployment numbers are calculated if you calculate the numbers the old you know you'd probably have more. a lot of people are going to be by the old way you know over time you know two or three times since the early eighty's we've we calculate. the way that the unemployment numbers are down and doing so has

legitimately lowered the unemployment rate every single time i see it legitimately i mean it has actually had a impact to lower the unemployment rate it doesn't it doesn't change the situation it just changes the number that gets reported and so what these conservative commentators are saying basically is that not only is this a systemic problem where you know optically this number is lower but in this specific instance we have someone who's cooking the books and i agree with the first part that you know the systemically we're seeing lower numbers than they should be as calculated thirty years ago on the reagan carter but i don't agree that they're cooking the books i believe that the number is what it is because we've had two thousand and ten census data change and they've updated the numbers according to that if you actually look at the household survey you'll see that the numbers reflect what we've seen all along which is that unemployment is is actually

are actually employment is is going up and so finally we're starting to see that reflected in this survey. i guess just interesting here because like i said they are part of these numbers all the time they don't question them and then suddenly when there's something that might look positive really seems like there's a political motivation behind it and you know the thing is the ridiculous part about this is the fact that this is january who cares about what happens and if you really want to cook the books you've got to start doing it when there is the general election now obama's not even a primary for goodness sakes i mean if the republicans going off against one another why would they be cooking the books in january when they could actually cook the books in. the campaign. you know with that political strategy i know lastly to one of the things that we heard from burning this week was that uncontrollable deficits might be. huge problem for the u.s.

and he went to so far as to signal that we might become the next what's your take i think that deficits are you know they are not good i think that they're too high over the longer term in terms of the structural deficit but if you want to take a more nuanced perspective first greece we're not going become the next greece because we have our own currency greece is a completely separate problem if you look at greece compared to the u.k. the u.s. with their own currency is incredibly low rates there's no comparison whatsoever even countries like spain which have a lower debt to g.d.p. have much higher interest rates it's all about the euro it has nothing to do with the problem in the united states for bernanke you to say that is actually irresponsible because he knows that there's a complete difference between the u.s. and greece i would also say that when you talk about the deficit the deficit is the outcome it's not the same put you know we spend whatever you spend in the deficit

happens as a result of that according to the unemployment rate the tax that you take in if you target the deficit specifically at the worst time in an economic cycle then what's going to happen is you have a pro cyclical approach it's going to make the cycle that much more. that much worse you can actually use the euro zone in that particular case because an example of. what's going to happen is just sucking money out of the economy in the deficit actually gets worse they're going to miss all their targets as a result you know i want you there you know why would. such a thing ever thanks so much for joining us tonight. i saw it comes and i had it he says of the end of the world is near that is if obama gets reelected we'll give you details as to all sides at a happy hour the morning after pill could be coming to a vending machine near you and voters got support from fellow tanner's of record.

people calling what you said for free and fair elections. and we're still reporting from the summer as you can hear behind me loud explosions .

you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm sorry welcome to the big picture.

our guys it's time for tonight's tool time award and tonight we're giving it to one of fox news's finest sean hannity took time on his nightly program to talk about one of the most popular ads from sunday's big football game. i've seen a lot of tough terus a lot of downturns in my life times when we didn't understand each other seems to be flawed starter times the fog of division discord and blame made it hard to see what lies ahead all that matters now is what's ahead how do we come from behind. how to read come together now do we where. yeah clint eastwood has definitely had an effect on a lot of viewers out there and the mainstream media now hannity host a discussion about the many metaphors that are hidden in this commercial he has guest.