a fair trial even possible at this point. i mean this. i'm a case officer director of operations. and you don't want to be on this man's bad side leave it to the g.o.p. to assemble a rag team of neo conservatives to act as their political henchmen and this seems resume as as potent as it is powerful both for you the dark side of the republican presidential race. and ending the bloodshed by arming the insurgency does that sound like a contradiction to you well it just might be the american strategy in syria will tell you how much the us stands to gain by opening its arms door. it's thursday february twenty third five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t well the man accused of the biggest leak in

classified information in u.s. history had his day in court today twenty four year old army private bradley manning was a reined in a military court in fort meade maryland he is facing a slew of charges including it in the enemy today manning deferred his plea he allegedly gave hundreds of thousands of secret documents and cables to the whistle blowing website wiki leaks celebrate manning as a hero for exposing the truth behind military operations his critics say he put lives at risk by making the secret information public but as he faces a military judge some question of manning stands a chance at a fair trial especially when you have the president of the united states saying this.

so at this point is a fair trial even possible for the whistleblower well joining me now is jack president joe press on for the bradley manning support network good to have you in the studio zack so you were there in court today quickly tell us how events played out well it was in an hour very fast today was the proceedings were done in about an hour or so we made sure to pack the courtroom with supporters we want to be there every day for brad we had down here today from occupy wall street we had logan price who actually shot that video you just showed there with president obama we also got a chance to speak with michael ratner from the center for constitutional rights he's down there acting as a pro bono attorney on behalf of julian a songe of wiki leaks ok and that video that you were just referring to as president obama basically saying that bradley manning is guilty and when you have the commander in chief of the united states saying something like that how much of

a fair how much of a chance does manning have at a fair trial well. never side to give bradley manning a fair trial in that case in particular with the president's statement that represents undue command influence which is prohibited by the uniform code of military justice we have to remember that this court martial process is being conducted by members of the military and ultimately the president is their commander in chief and i doubt that any one of them would want to contradict their commander in chief on an issue like this and going along with that some say that manning has already faced harsh punishment he was it howled for nineteen months in solitary confinement forced nudity allow. didley allegedly he was also tortured so is he already being punished before even being tried well exactly he's never technically had a real day in court yet these have only been pretrial hearings we're now

approaching something like six hundred some odd days that he's been held without without due process and so that's a violation of his rights there were the the other violations that you mentioned earlier i mean the obama administration is really making a mockery of its obligations under the geneva conventions under the un convention against torture treaties that have been ratified by congress and they have an obligation to allow the u.n. to do its work thus far they have been prohibiting one mendez the un's special repertoire on torture from being able to have a private meeting with bradley manning in order to investigate some of these claims of prisoner abuse and so it's it's really unconscionable you know i don't think we would want a foreign government to treat one of our troops this way let alone one of our own and you exactly like many regard bradley manning as

a hero he was recently nominated for a nobel peace prize but what about the argument that by releasing this classified information that he put american lives at risk when you joined the military you were choir to take this oath of honor and some see him see this as him violating that oath what's your response to that well first of all everyone in the military and the president as well is required to take an oath also to defend the constitution of the united states and i don't believe that brad has ever violated that oath and regardless of whether or not these allegations against him are accurate now the pentagon itself along with the state department and some other agencies they conducted their own. internal impact assessments of the wakey leaks materials and they found that there is no threat posed to our national security that our troops were never in harm's way they have refused to allow this evidence

to be considered in court. the reasoning you know not only. if they were to allow this in court it would not only really sort of call the bluff on their. you know fear mongering about hypothetical monsters in the closet so to speak but more importantly because it would expose the wiki leaks materials as having been improperly classified and not only in the case allegedly of bradley manning but in so many other cases what whistleblowers are showing us here is that our government has a massive problem with overclassification and it is often being used to conceal crimes and to conceal corruption and what we now know beyond any reasonable doubt is that we have a nexus of corporate and military power that is really hijacked our government policy and they've been able to do that because they've been able to operate outside the reach of accountability to the american people ok is that them in your opinion what would it take for

a justice to be served in this case well we're demanding as we have that all charges be dropped there's no reason for the obama administration to be retaliating against someone who exposed countless crimes who expose war crimes corruption goodness we have you know the secretary clinton authorized the theft of d.n.a. from members of the united nations and when will she be held accountable when will all these other folks be held accountable for the crimes that they've committed so far we're not seeing any of that and instead they'd rather use bradley manning as a scapegoat and lastly exact want to ask you what this case means for whistleblowers in the message that could possibly be set sent out to that this case well you know that issue go. raised yesterday we saw jake tapper from a.b.c. really grilling white house spokesman jay carney and saying you know the obama administration has now use the espionage act six times now to retaliate against

whistleblowers and that is twice as many as all previous presidents he's combined so i think the message that the obama administration is trying to send is very clear that if you see something don't say something we don't want to hear it and i think. that's unfortunate and we need to put a stop to that very interesting zach thank you for weighing in and coming on the show that was jack paisa vento press liaison for the bradley manning support network. well still ahead an r t calling in the neo republican presidential contenders are assembling a ragtag team of foreign policy advisers to help them take over the white house but this meeting of the minds might just be a meeting of the malicious we'll introduce you to some of the questionable characters that. you. just put a picture of me when i was like no new years old and don't you know the truth.

i'm a confession i am a total ghetto princess i love grabbing hip hop music and pretty. much it was kind of a yesterday. i'm very proud of the world without you it's a place. what drives the world the fear mongering used by politicians who makes decisions to break through it's already been made who can you trust no one who is you to be you with a global mission to reach you where are we heading state controlled capitalism is called fashion when nobody dares to ask we do our tea question more.

well in the race to be the next republican presidential nominee we see candidates trying to outdo each other on who is more conservative but aside from ron paul of one of these guys beats obama could we see a repeat of a previous administration and its policies are to correspond on a saucy turkey to takes a look at how bush era players are influencing the g.o.p. candidates. or scores a blast from the past rhetoric and a pretty clear cut idea about america's enemies kill them been there done that any action of that nature will be considered an act of war and act of terror fear mongering dictatorships respond to strength they don't want to spawn to weakness the rest of the world looks at it they don't laughs at it basically thinks it's a theater of the absurd a circus if you will the five republican candidates advisors my name is cofer black . i'm a case of service the direction of operations of the central intelligence agency

notorious for promising bush to leave terrorists with flies crawling across their eyeballs and the afghan enemies with their heads on pikes trying to put together the evil empire again reaching a neo con john boat than even a small national missile defense capability would be a threat to their first strike to which i say herat torture and wiretapping defender michael hates we've got to overthrow this guy iraq war supporter robert kagan is the right tactical thing to do and i'm consistently amazed at how little responsibility any of these people have taken for the really truly horrific things that occurred during their watch michael chertoff feeling with hurricane katrina and pushing through the civil liberties killing act and so described medieval sort of guy and dick cheney's buddy david wurmser look at all these guys they played very important roles in in the bush administration they don't seem to be particularly humbled from all the massive failures that they that they were

responsible for while their track records are far from enviable how could any self respecting person bring in any of these people that brought us that i grade they where are the afghan war oh that wasn't good enough how about the iraq war i got another one for you how about the war rod. these people are losers you are right it's going to be so no surprise is one provocation resurfaces the president should have built credible threat of military action maximum covert operations. to block and disrupt the iranian program including taking out their scientists most americans don't know the man behind the scenes they're not thinking about john bolton and what a weirdo he was at the un and how he. almost destroyed america's international reputation or. you know or for that matter really any of the you know any of the

people that romney wants to bring back but some embrace the rhetoric of coersion there are still i'm sure many americans that would that would love to see flies on eyeballs and other things of people all over the world us versus the world and who should we demonize today a mentality promoted by recycled cast of characters keeping americans in a perpetual state of war readiness and the rest of the world on heads especially if you're going to do. well to talk more about who is advising the g.o.p. candidates and what it would mean for america if one of them were to be elected i am joined now by michael he was independent journalist and foreign policy strategist welcome michael so now that we know who these advisers are are we looking of more of the same in terms of what we saw from the bush administration aside from ron paul of course. right insight from paul actually i think compared to

george bush the rhetorical of these characters is even more frightening than board which is which is amazing even you can say you know bolton you know over where i mean they based on their policies they want to keep quiet on the eyeball everybody you know americans too but. the arm again and almost obsession with the right wing christian you know and then once back in the whole thing and well in the israeli election they have this obsession with armageddon kind of frightening you know their back and people like santorum and gingrich they want you guys in office you know making a decision that they pregnant the pregnant line. and it's funny they use that word armageddon because we saw words similar to that in last night's g.o.p. presidential debate where the candidates took turns kind of pandering to their base and talking tough when it comes to cracking down on syria let's take

a listen to what rick santorum had to say we are going to have a cataclysmic situation with and a power that is the most prolific political rater of terror in the world and here is mary romney celebrating the demise of the syrian leader one little piece of good news and that is the key ally of iran syria is is as a leader that's in real trouble and we have to grab a hold of that like it's the best thing we've ever seen. so michael when we hear things like that how can we expect their foreign policy approach to be like especially when it seems like they're not at all afraid of jumping into another war right or their authority is even more. it's even more fiery that our current policies i mean. obama has a military. base. under the guise of humanitarian aid and the afghanistan

war killed an american citizen and. that he doesn't he doesn't need. because we need something even worse. we're going in the wrong direction already. because it is going to take is. right now it's interesting because that they would choose these guys because the bush administration wasn't exactly popular that you know that's why president obama was elected a lot of the country was calling for hope and change a change from the bush administration so why would the candidates revert back to that i think some of it is. one of the g.o.p. nomination they believe they have to say that they're probably right but it will be interesting to hear their retort when the general i get a feeling. what they really think this is how they really so it'll be interesting

as they backpedal backpedal. like all the exception to all of this is ron paul as expected last night he used the opportunity as he had done and g.o.p. debates past to push his anti-war message let's take a listen to part of. the sanctions already back firing what we're doing is literally enhanced things upon which i think of the sanctions is what we do with castro fifty years in castro is still there it doesn't work. so why don't any of the other candidates are all kind of looking at him like he's crazy there. but he does make a valid point why don't they seem to see this. so it's a good question and ron paul is very interesting character of all all the candidates you have the ideal foreign policy his foreign policy is better than. what the trinity with ron paul is on the domestic side you got civil rights

legislation you wouldn't mind or people died in the streets. so it's a tragedy that i like his foreign policy we can't have a guy like that not as for other reasons. and i have no idea why don't think they don't see that and i think. there's interest like that sense industry is real and all types of other issues driving these other sanity to take this militarist. and ron paul has had this consistent message of less government both when it comes to foreign policy add when it comes to domestic policy doesn't sound like you like his domestic policy at all what should ron paul do to appeal to more the conservative base you know as this race continues we see the other candidates trying to appeal to more of ted to pull more votes what does ron paul need to do to expand his base even more so. right yes from the from the conservative and we use

pretty consistent and you would technically meet a lot of the definitions of a true conservative but today's conservative and republican isn't your father this is. part of the conservative branch to date you have to bring a strong and it's. done a phobic racist undertones that that kind of goes along with it in order to win the primary and ron paul as you know is far and as far as that goes you know you just need to step up his retort again you know against our enemies. and then you don't most to our you know he's almost too relaxed and off the cuff about what you know troops from around the world you don't want to ensuring that his report. there probably turns a lot of people off where they don't trust the middle thinking that you know he's going to reduce the military budget. so you don't post to extremist report and he should tell it that many people. all right well that is an argument that people

make when it comes to ron paul going back to the team for foreign policy team that mitt romney and some of the other candidates have haven't aligned themselves with coffee or black john ball and these guys what are they pushing their candidates to say what kind of policy are they pushing. but their portion of policy you know this is you know santorum the perfect to have it's not a war on terror it's a war on islam you know that's the type of ideology i mean john bolton i mean his biggest criticism is always he comes forward when the enemy is the muslim and always what is for the ironic is like a guy like. you guys for example helped create the mess and now the taliban are all sort of the most evil thing in the world but back when there are they're just you know a little bit extreme on religion but no i mean there are terrorism and they are

they rightly are but they always were they always were and these guys love them. when they were they were just they were helping us feel so well that it was fine you know the one of the day. well michael you don't seem too happy with any of the candidates not even with president obama who is your best bet for this election well just you know comes paint said about governor government itself and the lesser of two evils it always comes down to that because you know there can be an r.t.c. got to choose someone alternately almost every election the lesser to evil then i would have to go with. well that is the argument that some people make that obama's best shot right now despite unemployment rates are his g.o.p. rivals michael thank you so much for coming on the show that was michael hughes independent journalist and foreign policy strategist. well the u.s. has handed a cut of then surely give arms to rebels in syria the obama administration says if

a political solution to the crisis proved impossible it might consider consider other options this amid warnings that washington's continuing efforts against the syrian regime could see it fighting side by side with al qaeda artist guy and she can report. amid bloodshed in syria more extremists are penetrating the country to help bring down a sot that's according to u.s. intelligence which says all current affiliated fighters were responsible for a series of deadly suicide bombings in damascus and aleppo targeted at syrian military and intelligence facilities has seen evidence of. extremist sunni extremists i'm not can't label them specifically as al qaeda but similar ilk who are infiltrating the opposition's groups. while fighting in syria continues the violence in neighboring iraq has dropped in

some areas by as much as fifty percent in the last few months this as an al qaeda leader iman al-zawahiri as called on his supporters around the world to back the uprising in syria i do. think that these men who call themselves the mujahedeen say they're on their way to fight a holy war against our song. in washington senators asked the head of america's intelligence james clapper you think what happens if assad falls here long are we prepared for the situation of a possible failed state were enjoys a safe harbor and refuge and from which to coordinate attacks his response bears no optimism there would be kind of a vacuum i think that would lend itself to. extremists operating in syria which is particularly troublesome some ask

a different question is the u.s. on the same side as all cry to syria and whether its policies are indirectly aiding the terrorists american strategists would have to be fools not to see what al qaeda is doing not to ask the question if it. good for al qaeda can it be good for us and not to look at. he may be a ruthless dictator and what he's doing but what comes after him when he falls i think al qaeda does its best work or it works best when it finds a country that is fundamentally a failed state this is why i'm against putting weapons in and aiding the anti resistance because an all out war there could be a disaster which leaves a failed state and syria even for many of those syrians who are not supportive of their president the fear of the alternative is far greater why are they sitting on the fence or why they are not in the streets with that if that is supporting the

movement and they are often too fierce is that one is that pushed aside the. and pushed aside that would be the careless the opposition in syria is very fractured they don't seem to be under anybody's control this spite concerns voiced by top u.s. intelligence officials about anti extremists washington has failed to widen its calls to include armed opposition therefore basically ignoring the fears of a huge part of the syrian population who don't want radicals gaining momentum and directing the country into chaos i'm going to check out reporting from washington our team. well tension with iran is fueling high gas prices across the u.s. and around the world over in the u.k. prices at the head a record high after a toronto locked oil exports to britain and response are in supporting new sanctions put in place by the u.s. over nuclear fears artie's up that it has more.

putting up with this two years ago would have cost me around seventy five pounds if think that thought well it now costs over a hundred because petrol in britain's never been more expensive the average for a liter of diesel soared to over one pound forty three two dollars twenty five cents the previous peak was during the libyan conflict last may and its people at the pumps who are paying the price again this is a disaster again for motorists and not only are they being stoned month after month now by these fuel price rises but there's also a concern that this is going to spread to the cost of every day items such as food because those transportation costs to get the food to store will be passed on to businesses and then the consumer it's a result britain has banked on when threatening to block iran's oil exports to the e.u. although the books are major customer individual members aren't britain imported

just eleven thousand barrels last year not even one percent of its total imports but in practice the tough talking has backfired iran struck first by freezing deliveries to british and french companies a move not harmful in itself but one that stoked fears in an already nervous market with iran's saber rattling could be for real it's already threatened to block the strait of hormuz a vital trading route iranis is trying at the moment before these sanctions come into effect to do what it can to talk up the price of oil without actually sacrificing any production so it's seeking to to benefit from maintaining its exports. a higher price for each barrel that it sells the timing of sanctions couldn't be worse a loss of production in south sudan yemen and the north sea already driving prices

higher with the rainy and. crude still in demand in asia it's the u.k. and it's motorists that are the hardest hit. i mean for that other computer use for . if i was right for myself i would rather go have a look at people why you make sure people drive in effect how much you come yes i think it probably does i think that's why they're using the soldier. it's hope the threat of sanctions will bring iran to the negotiating table over its nuclear program but so long as the numbers are rising here you may not be a wrong he's the first to buckle and what's become a dangerous game of brinkmanship experts predict the ongoing tensions twenty five percent will prices. on to bennett london. and be sure to stick around for the alona shell is coming up in just a half an hour well you've heard about the bill of rights what rights you have when it comes to cyberspace while the obama administration is trying to answer that very

question but a new consumer privacy bill of rights to protect your data companies that want to get their hands on it tonight a lot of will tell you what this bill means for your browser that is going to do it for now for the news i'll be right back here at seven pm with a brand new segment is the new york police department profiling muslims an a.p. investigation says yes will bring you all the details and in half in an hour and a half from now from one of the stories we covered you can head on over to our to dot com slash usa and check out our youtube aid it's youtube dot com slash r t america you can also follow me on twitter at liz wahl see us have a. max keiser this is the kaiser report worried about the men.