blumenthal who is the underwear bomber to life in prison he received not just one life sentence but four consecutive life sentences let's not forget this was for an attempted plot not a successful one nobody was hurt no one was killed no one was hurt except for maybe two would tell of himself now the reason that i bring this up is just to remind everybody when it comes to prosecutions based on charges of terrorism our civilian court system hands down tough punishment if anything what cases like this often reveal when there's actually a public record of what the defendant say in the courtroom wells that they turn out looking like average criminals fallible mentally unstable not by any means some kind of mastermind that threatens the existence of the united states and so it's interesting to look back and remember the very loud chorus of republican lawmakers that originally attacked the obama administration for the way they handled this case they couldn't believe that somebody like a bill with all of was mirandized they wanted him to be handed over to the military they called for enhanced interrogation techniques and they called on the obama

administration to have this handled in a military commission and guess what he was mirandized he spoke without being tortured and now a civilian court has convicted him and he will be serving time and nothing more will happen you know it's funny how suddenly we don't hear those voices anymore crying out that our civilian system for terrorist suspects will be a danger to our national security just another example of the hypocrisy but while those that have been arguing all along the way that this works just fine we have an example after example to prove that there's something else that should make us pause for a minute and unfortunately despite the proof the argument may still been lost don't forget of the n.d.a. of the president signed on december thirty first of last year includes a provision for the indefinite military detention of terrorist suspects including u.s. citizens this was passed by congress signed by the president despite the fact the military commissions don't have the success rate the tested method there are civilian courts. do despite the fact that indefinite detention puts our devotion to

human rights and civil liberties into jeopardy that will now apply all the time even when our wars in iraq and afghanistan are both over adam serwer mother jones wrote about this issue today he put it this way he said you think that somebody who couldn't even bloom self up right now would be a joke a punchline instead and accidentally setting himself on fire went to all of managed to inspire panic that culminated in congress altering the law all i can add to that one is that once again we hear when. our guide for a happy hour enjoyed you this evening as sam sachs producer of the big picture the tom hartman and dave cat nice national political reporter for politico hello gentleman oh thank you for joining me to handsome gentleman very very lucky tonight

ok let's first start talking about the movie i'm sure everyone's seen the trailer already but we're going to show you clip again anyway because i believe it comes out on monday take a look. before she was captured morales was working up jobs so it could be why she was abducted. but you're a soldier from the war. all right so the whole thing in this movie act of valor is that some of the actors are actual active navy seals and you know just kind of makes you wonder what that about is that cool apparently the navy seals didn't get paid anything to do the movies that's not going to go support or watch the movie like support your troops at the same time i guess gawkers said today that this is military right here and we just want to warn everybody that this is a military propaganda well if you're going to make any movie and you want the

department of defense involved in it it's going to be propaganda they have to sign off on all the scripts and i think it's no big surprise as can be propaganda. but i'm sure it's going to be really that oh it's crazy because it's an action movie right and don't they usually for movies that they try to make real they bring in consultants to try to make it as real as possible as you know without the risk is like you always if you're going to be using military equipment and the like they put a lot of rules on you anyway you're going to have to sign off and here it's just but there's a piece on the right in the nose of just as real navy seals. in the you know because i'm sure yours in the video game i'm sure they're going to be ready for war crimes very well. anyway let's talk about saggy pants. people really don't like the pants specifically in alabama alabama house of representatives well they're taking this issue up but i guess the first let's just residents of what they say about it. love to talk. to.

you might remember that classic song by general larry platt with the pants on the ground it's exactly the message folks like nineteen year old jules. or what his peers to hear is just. is very very. big parts of the house in alabama has already passed the saggy pants bill which would make it against the law to wear your pants down low and this is only in public don't worry about it but come on people really this is big government i'm guessing republican signed on to this but this is to me look the schools have to make their own rules i think teachers should be allowed some discretion but like owners where is the line i mean it's a girl who's wearing a really tight shirt is that offensive to some people and i complain about that but this is more the big government this this is generational warfare i mean this is a nineteen year old saying it's funny it was cool when i was you know in middle school to wear pants and i occasionally still see my parents in. your

pants well no i don't think you do is that you know one of the people that are going for this says is it infringes on another person's personal right if a student has their pants hanging down and a person has to see their underwear so it's it's are now you know you're you're taking away my rights because i have to look at your underwear it's absurd what i mean but then the next thing i mean. i mean cut off t. shirts if someone's got nasty arms with tattoos that someone has i mean come on i mean i think you can't wear you know see through shirts and write your browsing l. i've recently made a pretty sizable investment in drink go that are not going to get any returns on now because of this stupid law. it hasn't completely passed you know it isn't there the house is going to set it nags to add now the people who are pushing it say that if it passes the senate they really want to try to make it a state wide. ok let's talk about this other story that happened yesterday but

basically we have no fly zones in our own country i mean out of that take a look. a fixed wing plane described as a cessna one eighty two like this one was brought down at long beach airport after flying. in a no fly zone according to the secret service president obama was heading back to l.a.x. aboard marine one when a cessna entered restricted airspace fighter jets scrambled from march air base and intercepted the plane forcing it to land in long beach. so it was a drug plane and it's like you just. going to be trying to smuggle drugs in a plane and you should probably pay attention to where the president might be that day grilling really do they have to consider that i was think you want to you know check and check everything off make sure that sophisticated that you're flying a plane to do this i mean this wasn't just you know a sixteen year old transporting you know drugs in a car this seemed to be i mean if you're in a plane transporting it that seems really like a pretty. good enough answer just get operation should put a lot of land o.

the president is thirty miles away may want to go south i'm saying that i mean it's pretty discouraged with you know president obama has been going after marijuana for medicinal marijuana use ignoring questions and now this i know he claims you know their eyes know how to drive planes are going by how many any a mile a mile radius of no pot in the area which to me here. ok. let's talk about the app that the f.b.i. basically asking people to develop for them take a look. according to online requests from law enforcement and intelligence agencies they're after software that can sift through billions of posts and weed out those words and patterns the f.b.i. claims that could help prevent terror attacks here in the united states and it could help track for an uprisings like the arab spring. when el feel like i can't help but feel like this makes the f.b.i. just seem stupid if you want to track the arab spring you just go on twitter and

then everybody you know you're going to be i terrorist to have you need an entire i don't have to you know to have somebody monitor or that i don't believe that i don't have something like this already i mean we can go on and make something i mean i'm trying to do twitter but you can make a list and follow certain people and know what's going on guys or in this world and it may just be a signal to people that hey we're in the new we were in the game here so late to it maybe just don't admit it and do it kind of on the fly that's true but you know apparently i mean there had to be a rationale for this and i think probably it's they were were more tech savvy to me we've looked at i mean a lot of the critiques that was the f.b.i. wasn't wasn't prepared yet it was not to let the cia to you they were specifically how did you guys not know because we gather intelligence but i mean i don't know if i was the f.b.i. i would maybe not publicly advertise that now really and i know well what it is and that we. are you guys thanks so much for joining me tonight that's it for tonight's

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change. go ahead and whistle while you work just don't whistle blow on your employer because that could land you in trouble all of this thanks to a proposed bill that would severely weakened protections for informers so who then is the bill actually protecting. and while green might be the new black is driving america into the red some lobbyist seem to only care about the environment but not the economy from the keystone pipeline devival to the cylinder of fiasco is alternative energy driving the us into the ground how do we. then was shot in

europe to build the best bridges and high speed railroads and gleaming new airports if you build it they will come or in america's case if you need it built just called china we'll show you how america's road to recovery is being paid by china. it is friday february seventeenth seven pm in washington d.c. i'm christine you're watching our t.v. . well it's been nearly two years since private first class of bradley manning was arrested held as the main suspect in passing classified documents to the whistle blowing web site wiki leaks notice i said held and not charged manning wasn't charged until much later but that didn't stop authorities can from keeping him in solitary confinement for nine months often in conditions many top authorities in this country call torture before transferring him into

a medium security facility while i was about a year and a half before manning had his first day in court for his pretrial hearing now this thursday february twenty third his actual trial is set to begin now if convicted he faces life in prison. in the court room we can expect to hear the prosecution talk about how manning communicated national defense information to an unauthorized source how he put this country in danger and how he aided an enemy where you probably won't hear is about the torture is conditions manning was held in or about how there's been a lack of harm to national security from the release of these documents regardless it's pretty clear manning will be made an example of setting the precedent the government hopes will dissuade others from committing similar crimes. this trial is going to be watched by a lot of people a lot of people on both sides of this issue now starting this evening a whistle blower's conference at the university of california berkeley is being

held it's called off coupon the truth in just a few hours there's actually going to be a bradley manning panel now on this panel the pentagon's paper author daniel ellsberg daniel ellsberg has been very outspoken about the treatment of bradley manning he was one of the whistleblowers back from the seventy's and of the government didn't like what he did either but a lot of people now look back on what he did as heroic and inspirational also on that panel and right and ray mcgovern now one person in attendance will be activist cindy sheehan she joins us now from berkeley california. hey there cindy you were in some ways a whistle blower yourself although not on any employer you just have been very outspoken about the wars in iraq and afghanistan especially after your son was killed there serving several years ago talk to me a little bit about what you're doing this week in berkeley and what's on the agenda

. just live there an interesting format for one thing it's very. organic and so i think we're going to have a lot of interesting things come out of the conference but there is a panel specifically about bradley manning today like you said was ray. ellsberg and bradley manning his case is so tragic because a i think people who have been paying attention to what's going on over in iraq and afghanistan and all these years nothing nothing that he allegedly leaked was a surprise to anybody but as you said daniel ellsberg has lived a lot on full life he did something very heroic and helped and the vietnam war are and he's been outside of prison but why brat bradley may and him up in prison for the rest of his life which is just really to me and it's heartbreaking and heart

wrenching to think that he did something so heroic and he might have to pay and also this is a whistleblower occupy the truth conference and barack obama told us he was going to have the most transparent administration in american history has actually been a disaster for civil liberties and his administration is persecuting not prosecuting but persecuting bradley manning and under his administration and there has also there have also been actually six people prosecuted under the espionage act which is really interesting you talk about this transparency and this you know world war one piece of legislation has been used to charge people who have leaked government secrets that six people may not sound like a lot but before president obama there was only three in the entire u.s. history so i think that's pretty interesting what do you think that says about what's going on here. well i you know i have been searching in the truth

every since my son was killed but i think it is a suppression of the truth we don't see it we see those arrested today r.t. we're very happy for the station and the does tell the truth but you don't see stuff about bradley manning on corporate media you don't see stuff about espionage or. actually were palestinian activists who are being persecuted by the obama administration and the justice department so i think it says that the truth they want to suppress the truth think they don't want the average american to find out what's really going on in these wars of aggression and with our own civil liberties and something else that we haven't been seeing on you know the big three networks i guess you could call them is a bill that's floating around here in washington that's actually called the whistleblowers improvement act although the only people who would it improve things for would be those committing the wrongdoing now this bill it requires employees

who see some wrongdoing in their companies to first report those wrongdoings to their employer before they take any regulatory agencies it would also take away incentives for these whistleblowers among other things so far this bill has only made it its way through the house subcommittee on capital markets and government sponsored enterprises but it did make its way out and it could be considered any time by the house financial services committee so i mean just the fact that there are people in this government that are fighting to make conditions more stringent fighting to make it so i think another provision in that bill would make it so even if the employer does tell a regulatory agency like the f.c.c. the f.c.c. would have to notify that corporation or government entity before taking any action i mean the fact what do you think it says andy that there are people elected officials who seem to be not serving the interests of the people. well it's the

same thing that we have been seeing with the occupy movement and since barack obama has also become the president the united states. and this is actually decades and generations the corporations the one percent using the government to protect its interests and protect its money and the government our government and. the businesses are so intricately linked as hard to tell them apart at this point and i don't think that the federal government does keep the interests of the people at heart look at in the military if a woman is sexually assaulted or abused or even raped she's supposed to go through the chain of command which will actually harm her instead of helping her and so it's just a tragic situation where the one percent in our country are the legislation is for them the last protect them and protect their wealth and protect their position and

that's what the occupy movement is addressed in and i'm glad we're calling this conference occupy truth i think that's a really good point that you bring up that situation with the military there certainly countless situations of whistleblowers or alleged whistleblowers in government and intelligence fields and of course within the dodd frank bill there were supposed to be more whistleblowers within you know these big banks within wall street corporations where do you think sandy and we're almost out of time where do you think would be the best possible place to start in terms of expanding rights for whistleblowers. well i think that we have to has to be a real grassroots people's movement and i think we're starting line here to help expand get in the truth and take it taking it over by the people who are not putting our trust in the government because obviously that's a very misplaced trust all right well good luck this weekend at the conference i'm sure there's going to be a lot of interesting things discussed and debated activist cindy sheehan joining us

from berkeley california let's talk now about going green in america i mean a lot of things to a lot of different people but overall we're talking about making decisions that help or at least don't harm the environment there is even in this country the green lobby that throws money and influence behind projects it likes and spend plenty more to try to stop projects it doesn't but from the fiasco at the cylinder solar plant to tough times and a threat of record high gas prices there's a large part of this country that is caring less and less about going green for the first time in more than thirty years also a new nuclear power plant was given the green light by fabulous federal regulators and the atlanta based southern company will soon begin its project to build two nuclear reactors at its site south of augusta ga i spoke earlier with jim cavanaugh the managing editor for reason dot com about all of this here's his take.

i think it's so there's a need for the energy and i don't understand why the nuclear energy industry still needs to be subsidized when the one thing nobody argues about a nuclear plant is that it doesn't produce a lot of energy this is a valuable stuff it produces a lot of energy which unfortunately it's looking more and more like a lot of the alternative resources really don't produce what we need so there is a need for this energy and that sort of wins the argument whether it's. green or not green is probably another question but let's talk about you know here in washington we're always sort of talking about different ways in which this government spends its money i know energy is certainly one area that a lot of people sort of keep their eyes i know you're one of those people talk a little bit about the energy budget and what you see laid out in there as good and what you see as problematic. some things are good you know i'm not sure they were arrived at for the right reasons but for example subsidies to fossil fuels

the budget claims at least the administration is claiming that it's eliminated four billion dollars of subsidies to fossil fuels which is terrific and why does the fossil fuel industry need subsidy these are the people who sell us gas and heat our houses it seems to me they have a very regular source of income so that's great unfortunately that subsidy rather than just being a limb unaided because we're broke because the government is out of money and because it is severely in debt and if the government were your best friend you would commit that person to bankrupt. even despite that we're still spending even more money on subsidies having gotten rid of that four billion we're going to spend more than four billion in two thousand and thirteen on so-called energy resources this is the nuclear energy agency. the energy department and it used to be called the nuclear energy agency it evolved out of this agency that started it way way

back when shakespeare was still writing his plays and it was. designed around the idea that nuclear weapons and nuclear power are a new kettle of fish and we need a new department to handle them it has strayed from its mission since jimmy carter created the department of energy in the seventy's and now it's you know a let's not even the majority of the budget now goes to what we supposed to go to to the safety of our nuclear stockpile and making sure that nukes don't explode or get into the wrong hands or any of that kind of stuff and to make sure that nuclear power plants are safe it only it doesn't even spend half of its budget on that the rest of it is for this other stuff some of it's legitimate some of it is remediation of toxic zones but other stuff is just the subsidies that are going to go to more so windrows and more beacon powers and all the rest of them that are piling up like fish. on a fishing expedition and if not of course just the government that has a hand in here i mean. let's talk about the green lobby you know all these these

dollars and this amount of support that you know goes behind causes in the name of saving the earth and all that kind of stuff but that's not always what happened so talk to me a little bit about sort of the complex relationship between the green lobby and the rest of america. it's complex and the relationship of the green lobby with itself is complex we were just touching on nuclear power there are some people who say you know that's less. carbon emitting or somehow it contributes to global warming less but you know so that's one branch and they maybe have won out a little bit in getting that plan approved there are others who have been fighting for example the keystone x.l. pipeline again this is needed energy for an energy hungry country if we don't want to continue our slide the united states and in many ways i don't want to overemphasize our slide it's pretty good here in the united states and in fact many

other countries are catching up and that's good news but if we want to stay ahead as a country we're going to need energy and this unfortunately is one where the state department's involved in all these other bureaucracies are involved because it's transnational and people still believe in national borders so canada and the united states technically are different countries so we have to get all of these bureaucrats involved and now the whole thing is screwed up we need the energy we need i like having a house that's hot at night even in a way sometimes i get cold it's interesting though and you mention the keystone pipeline this is one example of sort of these pieces of energy legislation of these ideas. related to the environment that in turn get sort of turned into political tools for example. the keystone energy. pipeline was in a bill and then the president decided not to move forward with it but really it's been sort of a little wedge issue politically speaking why does this happen so often.

because it's politics is the nature of politics it's the organization of hatred's so people are just saying you know the other side screwed up or this screwed up in this case i'm happy to see the president things a little bit on this i think it was a ridiculous cave and. he actually had his own coalition split there were some of his union backers wanted the keystone x.l. pipeline to go through a lot of people want to go through who are not just it's not just because they want to rape the environment or something it's because they recognize that these these energies keep people alive they allow more of us to stay alive and they allow more of us to travel and do all the things that would make us human finally tim we are and it's very clear here in washington i'm sure it is there as well in an election year all kinds of issues being dangled from contraception to to everything but what do you think i mean you're you sort of really have your eyes on some of these issues what do you think are going to be big election year issues regarding energy

and the environment. i think you're going to continue to see the energy department's loan guarantee program become a big political football i think so winter itself may have run out of steam but as i said more of these companies are declaring bankruptcy every day that's the vicissitudes of the market another thing that will be of interest is the new budget contains a lot more energy for a lot more money excuse me money the fuel of politics it contains a lot more money for our type of project just for green energy things and again this is this is supposedly a little better because it doesn't give it directly to companies who are going to compete in the marketplace but all of this is wasted money the market will figure it out that people will figure it out for themselves they don't need washington bureaucrats telling them what to do you figure it out every time you pay your gas bill or yet side to put gas in your car or whatever you do.