people calling like you said for free and fair elections. and they're still reporting from the. map 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 that everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm charging welcome to the big picture.

as today we'd like to address we'd like to take a moment to address an error that was brought to our attention that we made while reporting on bradley manning's article thirty two pretrial hearing at fort meade maryland one of our updates aired in december we noted that adrian lamo was a paid informant and so we'd like to make a correction to that statement when i was not a paid informant when he communicated with bradley manning in an online chat room the chance the subject subsequently led to the army privates arrest according to wired limo became a confidential informant for the army from july of two thousand and ten and held that role until mid to late two thousand and eleven over he was compensated by the government for any expenses incurred during travel and was given a new hard drive to replace the one that was taken into evidence by the military so we apologize and we regret the error and we'll continue to bring you all the details surrounding p.f.c. bradley manning as we learned them. well today is the very fourteenth valentine's day today when people all over the country doing their best to dazzle their loved

ones with tokens of their affection anonymous on the other hand has come up with its own way of saying happy valentine's day by packing of course an event of a have dubbed hack the day members of anonymous have targeted pennsylvania best based security company combined systems incorporated that name sounds familiar to you think back to last year and we saw uprising in egypt and efforts to overthrow then president mubarak. a number of photos have been posted on social networks suggesting the tear gas conscious well made in the united states the canisters have branded with the name and address of combined systems a company based in the state of pennsylvania. well that's right that same company has become the focus of of anonymous efforts today not only have they taken down the web site for the company but they've also allegedly taken personal information of employees and clients like e-mail addresses phone numbers and passwords they've also published a series of intercepted e-mails from the company which seem to confirm the hack although at this time we can't vouch for their authenticity now the hackers have

a history of focusing on security companies government organizations and basically anybody who opposes the occupy movement and uprisings in the arab world so i guess that it's not too surprising that c.s.i. his website was taken down and its statement anonymous reaffirmed its recent calling c.s.i. war profiteers who quote shop magic chemical weapons to military and cop shops around the world steven went on to say you shot gas protesters running them off public parks in the u.s. several dozen died because of your tear gas used in egypt did you think we forgot why did you not expect us but why did the hacktivist choose today to protest the company well not only is it valentine's day but the fourteenth also commemorates year since the uprisings in bahrain began to get another gulf country the scene protests and reports say that at least sixty people have died during the clashes between demonstrators government forces some of whom died after exposure tear gas also not forget u.s. ally saudi arabia sent troops to bahrain last year during the height of those protests and according to the new york times more people have taken to the streets in that country this week to mark the one year anniversary of the demonstrations

and just like we've seen in the past police relied on tear gas to keep the protesters away. so at the same tear gas made by c.s.i. it's quite possible now anonymous. indicated that there would be a series of hacks today when it tweeted the message stay tuned but at this point we've only found the pennsylvania company to be a victim of today's actions but i think it's safe to say that anonymous has left an impression on the company and if nothing else a valentine's day at they'll definitely remember. well there's an important visitor in town today chinese vice president being who is in line to become the next chinese leader next year was welcomed by president obama here in washington after meeting in the oval office a state department luncheon was held with the likes of henry kissinger blank and fine of goldman sachs as well as the c.e.o.'s of chevron dream works disney and

coca-cola on attendance now president obama said that he welcomes that china's peaceful rise and expects relations between the two countries to continue on a cooperative track this relationship is obviously a complicated one take a look at public opinion here in the u.s. a gallup poll from february tenth shows that fifty three percent of americans view not the u.s. but china as the world's leading economy and a.b.c. washington post poll from today shows that fifty two percent of americans have an unfavorable impression of china so with so much competition what will the relationship look like between the two joining me to discuss that is economic analyst gonzalo lira and sol thanks so much for joining us tonight and i guess for starters what do you say about this poll this is the second year in a row now that americans say that they see china as the leading economic power and not the u.s. . well it's an accurate perception because china is america's creditors and so if your creditor is always the most important person in your financial relationships we owe chinese a lot of money and so they're the boss right. now he isn't quite the leader yet

right this isn't happening until next year but how important do you think it is to try to solidify if you can really even use that word this relationship now while they have the time is here in the states well it's important for a number of reasons number one we want to make sure let me phrase the american government wants to make sure that china will continue to purchase treasury bonds and will not start dumping treasury bonds will not lose faith in the treasury bond market and so it's very important for the further department i'm sure geithner's drones are out there talking to the chinese counterparts time in the united states is a great credit risk and blah blah blah so it's important in that sense now of course this gentleman here is definitely going to be the next leader of the chinese never make any kind of. you so he's the next man in charge and so it's logical that they're going to try to trump it is funny when you think of his guest list at the state department luncheon that i just mention right we have all been sad century

kissinger chevron it's very clear the business plays a big role in this relationship. sure they round up the usual suspects and they're all there to convince the chinese to keep on not lending money to the united states and the chinese have problems of their own and are very worried about what's going on the united states and in europe because after all china is producing goods and services for the european market markets and if those two markets begin to tank china begins to have trouble and course there's a task between the chinese companies party and the chinese people whereby the party controls political power in exchange for giving employment to the chinese people now that tacit agreement is broken and you're going to have why it's an essentially our spraying in china which nobody wants so you know it's in everybody's best interests in this relationship running smoothly and for china to tell europe and yet states get out of this recession depression by any means possible while the

same time the trade is a big issue between the two countries right now u.s. china and chinese trade deficit right now that to twenty two hundred ninety five billion dollars now when the president is giving a state of the union address of the last month he announced this trade enforcement unit that would be investigating things like this in countries such as china to think about is a good idea or that i think that the chinese just kind of die because it's what it is which is a domestic political. blah blah you know and it means nothing in the real world contacts. trade religion sugar free china to it's going to continue we call china is the most important relationship the united states has insofar as buyers of treasury bonds and and suppliers of consumer goods and products but the problem is that there's a famous saying in in banking circles when you can't pay a million dollar debt to your bank that's your problem but if you can't pay a billion dollar debt to the bank that's they're all sitting in the chinese

recognize that the united states has done so far into debt that is very difficult it is to be able to pay stubs back and so the chinese want their money but they don't want to stabilize the whole situation in the process of getting their money they don't want an american default and so both sides are very careful in their relationship because they both recognize how fragile both of their respective positions are the chinese party has to make sure that it's keeping its its people happy the american government has to make sure that it's keeping its people and so they have to work in tandem and that's what they're doing why i think i wonder if you agree with me here that we saw some of the balance there play out just in even the different statements that we heard from president obama who's talking about this peaceful rise of china about our economic cooperation versus joe biden who was was acting a little tougher right that he was saying that china didn't become this economic power in the world through some vacuum that it's all thanks to an international system and there are rules that everyone must follow and if you want to be have

a relationship the game has to be played fairly so as a kind of good cop bad cop that they're doing. yeah basically you know the carrot and stick because of course the stick is is joe biden as you rightly point out and the issue is of course copyright and patent infringement which the chinese don't really respect it's a lot for property at this point that's what the united states is export it's exploiting. patents and copyrights and if those patents and copyrights are being stolen by the chinese where by simply the chinese take the good ideas that are being developed and states and manufacture them without any kind of. the american brains behind these ideas patents copyrights what have you then of course the end state starts to loose and that's putting it sits wants to run and that's the kind of economy that i'm from we have and if the chinese continue to just rebar patent and copyright it's locked in the next it's going to suddenly cut off very little it's that china is going to make greater and greater inroads into american markets

and frankly into american exports and so that's the problem that united states has they can't really part that allows the chinese but they have to bark a little bit in here that my head down can remain somewhat our stream and behind thanks nic joins us tonight. thank you for having me thankful. that. people calling what you said for free and fair elections. and they're still reporting from the. map you can hear behind me loud explosions.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so sleep you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you. are welcome is a big issue. our

guys have time for show intelligence program the last time we spoke about the twenty think the billion dollar housing settlement between the government and the banks but it's only think million really enough money to make up for all of those that have suffered only asking if you thought the banks or the american homeowners in the end of this deal was going to produce richardson assented to find out what she had to say president obama said that the new twenty six billion dollar housing settlement will begin to turn the page on a period of an abuse of foreclosure by banks but we have to ask when the pages are turned in the book is closed who really won the day that american homeowners or did

the banks come out ahead on the deal now don one said the banks won them by an extremely large margin down the. said it's a terrible deal twenty six billion between five giant banks the c.e.o.'s bonuses are probably more than the whole settlement and one pointed out that from the settlement families who have lost their homes come out with a check of two thousand dollars he wants to know how can two thousand dollars compared to a home now let's look a little deeper into who may really be winning from this settlement the number we quoted earlier twenty six billion is the total settlement out of that seventeen billion is credits for principal modifications smith over at new capitalism points out that these mortgages are own mostly by investors three billion of the settlement will go to refinancing eight and only five billion will be direct cash payments this will mean that fifteen hundred to two thousand per borrowed for clothes between september two thousand and december twentieth eleven so when the pages are turned in the book is close who do you think really won well i think it's

pretty clear. now as always we appreciate your responses and here's our next question for you earlier in the show and spoke to salon dot com glenn greenwald about the beating of the drum for war with iran he argues the media is actually doing the government in this buildup so what do you think is leading the charge the media or the government let us know what you think on facebook twitter and you tube and those response just might make it on. well tonight we have some news that courtesy of a foyer request which should make you feel a little uneasy about congress's ability to protect your privacy because guess what congress had no idea what the d.o.j. was doing with its wiretapping capabilities for at least four years just a short while ago reports the detail the d.o.j. is wiretapping of americans magically popped up on the department of justice his website after a handful of privacy experts got their hands on the original materials through that boy request they found out these reports are actually old and they're now appearing because well they forgot to do it years ago there is

a twenty five year old log called the electronic communications privacy act requires the department of justice to reported. surveillance techniques to congress every year and it details two techniques in particular first one is a pen register where officials can obtain non-content information from outgoing internet and telephone communications and those would include dial phone numbers and who received e-mails and potentially even the subject line of those sent e-mails but not it was actually said or written within the conversations the other is trap and trace capturing is also gathers non-content information from online activity and phone calls over that's for incoming communications to this is vicious individual now these two techniques are for a large far as how the government gathers information about people they want to keep tabs on or to post nine eleven era they've been keeping tabs on a lot of people in fact the report shows that in two thousand and four wiretapping was used almost eleven thousand times and in two thousand and eight wiretapping was used more than twenty one thousand times that's almost doubling the amount of times

the feds utilize these techniques over the course of four years and in two thousand and nine there were almost twenty four thousand in judicial orders for surveillance meaning that we're still not sure of congress's even seen any reports for two thousand and ten and twenty eleven but how about this for the icing on the cake a law review article suggests that the d.o.j. didn't release any surveillance from one thousand nine hundred ninety nine to two thousand and three either so that is a huge chunk right of the nine eleven monitoring post nine eleven monitoring and congress was totally in the dark so it's scary that we haven't seen these definitive numbers until now and what's worse is that we've learned about this big government fail through for your requests which reveal that it was a staffer for former senator russ feingold who discovered that nobody was reporting this information that's right nobody else in congress was even paying attention for four or five years they either weren't aware the d.o.j. wasn't doing its job they simply forgot or i guess they just conveniently turn a blind eye so that's our government work for you on one hand the o'jays basically

going unmonitored when it comes to invading a person's privacy meanwhile congress either doesn't care or they're just giving the justice department free rein. so which one is worse well it's kind of hard to tell but quite frankly both are definitely at fault here another clear sign that both chambers of the government could care less about your privacy so let's weigh it out right d.o.j. not reporting to congress which they are legally obliged to do or at the same time you have congress who shirked all responsibility for the american people's constitutional rights either through gross negligence or simply turning a blind eye so you tell me who's the worst offender the way i see it i think they're all guilty. well a new pew study has some people up in arms if you center on the states found that more than twenty four million voter registration records in the u.s. or about one in eight are an accurate out of date or duplicate so nearly two point eight million people are registered in two or more states and perhaps up to one point eight million registered voters are dead but does this mean that the chances of voter fraud are higher or just that our paper based registration system is out

of date an error prone experts will probably tell you that it's the latter but as we watch republican led legislature is one state after another pass or push for strict voter id and registration laws becomes even more important to break down the details get the truth into this debate so here to discuss that with me as attorney and blogger behind founder of legal speaks dot com and huffington post contributor to me thanks so much for joining us tonight for having me before we get into i guess all of the details all the information back there let's just look at this specific report that comes out today right when somebody hears that one in eight of these voter records have some kind of a problem one doesn't sound so good as it doesn't sound good and it. is the idea that there is this photo fraud rampantly running rampant and it's really not i mean if you think about it on a commonsense basis if you've ever moved from one state to the other i moved from maryland to d.c. i didn't i change my address change utility bills i forwarded mail i did not change and let the whether i should or not i did not let the board of election supervisors

know that i had moved and likewise when people die usually the estate of the person they're taking care of everything but changing the election where they vote and their registration and letting them know the person has died there to see that just generally doesn't happen so that really explains why there are the consistencies there but that doesn't prove that there is voter fraud that there are dead people voting that they're people voting in two or three states it just shows that they're on the books for more than more than one state all right so then if that's the case right if this was. civically is an example not an example of widespread voter fraud why do we have these bills that are being passed in states all across the country to combat voter fraud as if it is a huge issue are there any statistics to say that voter fraud is a really big deal i haven't seen any so for really there's not much distance i mean back in two thousand and two to two thousand and five somewhere within that period the justice department did a survey and what they found was eighty six convictions and of those eighty six

convictions they really were not of the kind of voter and person nation the ones that we're talking about to combat voter fraud so disillusions eighty six within one year with a weighty sense of in that period of time i think it was eighty six within a three year period of time eighty six people not enough to sway in a way the six and that anything is right and again it wasn't for vote and person nation most of the convictions fell into the category of felons who think that they're eligible to but they really aren't eligible to vote because they are still on parole so and even the justice department has done an additional survey and it's come out to be some scant number like twenty four but yet and still republican legislation is changing the laws and practically half the states to show that we need all these id laws passed here's kind of a fun little idea right from the a.c.l.u. in minnesota they're director there just offered to pay a thousand dollars to anybody who can show a recent case a voter in person ation in the last ten years in that state i mean do you think of

those are the kind of gimmicks that you need in order to prove to people that voter fraud is not the problem because otherwise why are republicans actually getting these laws passed right why are they winning the debate on a public level when it comes to i think what we hear in the media a lot of time too i think they're winning the debate because most people think that are being polled that they have an identification so the people that are being polled they're thinking what is the big deal just get an id be over and done with it so you can vote no id no vote they're not really polling the people who are twenty five percent of african-americans. have the correct voter id a valid identification to eighteen percent of senior citizens over the age of sixty five don't have one one in five students do not have a driver's license which is one of the other things that you need in order to vote so they're winning the debate because they're not really polling a lot of those people who don't have the correct identification to vote i love the a.c.l.u. is there but i don't think that it's going to change anything because unfortunately

it's like the people that think you need a voter i.d. you need photo id to vote they think that that's the end the discussion is just so simple just get one and unfortunately the people who are going to be most affected and most harmed by it african-americans senior citizens those people who are at this able many women regardless of race who changed their name when their recently married or changed their name back when they're recently divorced they're going to have some issues and some of these states and those people they're not really targeting in terms of going to you is that you know a sign of looking people might have a certain political leaning right that might vote for one party over the other you could say especially if you look at young people if you look at women officer of housewives if you look at african-americans well they're probably more. balanced to vote democratic rather than republican that's at the start of show you well that's right that their republican led legislature that was really split down the middle i mean is there mcgrath's progress to think that no we don't need this because we don't need the law because there is no been any proof that shows that we need the

law and republicans want to flat out suppress the law i mean that's just the bottom line they want to disenfranchise groups of people who might be more than likely to vote democratic and i thought they were all about freedom or you just got back from checking out. the all you heard of the word freedom freedom freedom all over again but i really want to talk about this other issue too you know you mentioned if you move you change your name we do have a bit of an outdated system so there are some solutions out there for example when they released the story so their solution was to create a multi-state dad. center will give officials voter registrations voter vehicle records and death certificates from other states so they can always spot something do you think that's a good idea i mean does that create certain problems legally or civil liberties issues with what would be a proper fix in your mind what i see is the issue is that it's a cost factor i mean even changing the laws in the states that are being changed on the voter id laws it's a cost that's associated with it i mean they just go on the books and get change

and people just don't come off the books and there is not a cost in terms of additional manpower additional money that's involved with it and many of the states are already poor we're already cast wrap so do we really want to put our effort into changing the database at this point in time do we really want to put effort into doing that when in fact it's not needed it's not necessary because again the people who are the people who move from one state to the next who are on the books either in two states three states or whatever they're not trying to vote in two or three states all right so the problem is a little bit overblown and i guess as you were in the past through the problems maybe the why is it easier to fly than it is in this country debbie thanks so much for joining us thank you so much. quick break when we get back one lawmaker is upset the part of justices the law rights division is hiring experienced civil rights attorney here with our schools i report and happy hour lots of the latest

fourth illustrated cover and why was this break down presidential politics into a high school popularity contest all the return. of people calling what you said for free and fair elections. and we're still reporting from the same as you can hear behind me loud explosions.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else hears you some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew you don't i'm trying hard to think.

our guys it's time for tonight's tool time war and the honor once again goes to lamar smith the congressman from texas but this time it is not to do with him trying to restrict speech on the internet or rather his complaints about the department of justice is hiring process so you are smith has come out and accused the department of justice's civil rights division of hiring bias and his reason is that the civil rights division is hiring too many civil rights lawyers yep that is an actual reason that he's claiming because he practicing civil rights lawyers tend to be more liberal so in smith's bizarro victimhood world because the d.o.j. is hiring civil rights lawyers.