today on our t.v. is something all of us love of the tongue others a slap in the face to republicans president obama showed his true colors in a candid moment with russian president dmitri medvedev so what does this mean for relations between the two. four. and a half of his groups are going through information covertly but so is new york's finest and the muslim community community isn't alone in getting a second glance turns out also very in counterterrorism you know most new yorkers are giving a thumbs up to the n.y.p.d. . isn't going to mean a. little god it's not pizza it's

a vegetable or so says congress american lobbyists are supersizing their power over congress and letting their hunger for money dictate our laws i'll give you one example how. well it's monday march twenty sixth my name's christine and you're watching r t well president obama spent the weekend in south korea and while there he had a meeting with russian president dmitri medvedev yet tensions between the two countries have been a bit high lately between the difference of opinion regarding syria and of course those strong clashes over missile defense the two leaders clearly do have lots to discuss but it appears president obama wants to wait a bit before dealing with those issues here he is with me in video of anna looks like a two man at hopes the conversation might be kept a little more under wraps. for microphones were turned up take

a listen. thank you. all right so an acknowledgement here that should the president when the election which he seems to expect will happen then they can really get down to business stephen leatherman is a writer and host of the progress of radio news hour our he's in chicago and joins me to talk more about that if the let's talk about first some of these issues between the u.s. and russia if president obama wins a second term what do you think this flexibility that is asking for you know what do you think working things out will actually mean. ok so you know i think it's more to know what actually will air balloon. ability america's systematically whether it's george bush or a lot of the reagan or bill clinton americans systematically violates that it makes

russia knows that it's china knows this the so-called reset. the reset never really researched properly in may goodness knows of course putin knows it and the election goes sides claim or obama claims well you know you had a way to share and you have a new man coming you know we have a leg showing in november i hope to be hussein against thing you know but the idea of close ability i think it's nonsense kristie well some people are saying that you know should obama when it will mean you know critics of the president saying it will most likely mean more hostility towards israel and also regarding russia more accommodation to vladimir putin's russia what do you think about that. well the american media bashes her knowledge out you know that you're a you see what happens see

a television and print media oh they really rushed him up last diseases and maybe they like a little bit better but concerned about coming in because he said more backbone to stand up he would lose your isp i could hardly wait for him to take a look at christie. it should be very interesting hiway talk about microphones not being turned on us as you probably recall our t.v. was probably recalled the most famous incident back in the 1980's was when ronald reagan even though the microphone was still on the talk about bombing russia and. union i get back what do you think i mean do you think these guys are really didn't know that their mikes are turned on. probably they didn't know somebody slipped up if they somebody missing a mattel approach your music you know. i think of you a little bit more circumspect lou if the whole world was listening this doesn't

happen very often but yeah i was going to say if not the first time it happened is not the first time it happened even with president obama and it let's have a quick reminder of another incident like that and barack obama nicolas sarkozy are now being quoted from a conversation they had about israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu the exchange was overheard at the g. twenty summit sarkozy reportedly said of netanyahu quote i can't stand him anymore he's a liar president obama then responded you may be sick of him but me i have to deal with him every day journalists who overheard the remarks at first agreed not to repeat them but the comments were published in israeli newspapers certainly as we remember those comments had a little bit of attached to them do you what do you think about these these comments between obama and i guess i mean what's really the result that that's where i really see the results because you know if you know what i think. is really

so good that america and america has good spies in israel who samir really will leave you so you don't share with the leaders i think he said it was very much show where the it was. there's not the usual kristie it was the policy to what extent will go on with israel once if i'm also use real good words good sort of what's really low. if eric isn't the only one is that if you want if you can resign a solution is. the most i'm going to. call his energy so he can say things that leader but. is the longest the polar sea. is the step to build it is real medicine have to be a hundred percent just mostly in israel also. well that's to connect some of those dots and we talk about israel getting what it wants. you know there's

a lot of sympathies that have happened recently between china and russia regarding syria and what should be done with there with that country what's to be done about the violence calling on about the regime and sharia law assad regime connection causes me in terms of that different how major of an issue is that between us on one side and you know russia and china on the other side and i think i think there is a chasm of christine russia and china absolutely no one living in mortal replicated in syria bestowed follow i'll go away go away if. nato but in a way will russia and china intervene that's a big question i think they're around to write about it by consider it i hope that they would do so or i hope they would take enough action in advance to prevent it

if you just laid out a red light and say this line would be crossed look what we are now speaking of obama professes to want peaceful resolution in syria he goes along suppose we will see another way for peaceful negotiations the non-binding presidential statement from the security council was passed but i wrote an article about it because of worries because it says need doesn't go a lot further measures will happen but unspecified very very worrisome but. what's concerning is here obama is saying one thing edge doing that the headlines today obama is a boy it was you know i'm lethal aid to see. here use our position what is it include any clues communication equipment communication for. coordinated attacks to check with the. news didn't know you turkey in washington d.c.

so washington saw washington or rubble saying one thing to what you know theory and absolutely in saudi arabia in turkey in jordan with israel is a by weapon if you are positioned emphasize in our eye while we will have course keep our eyes especially is specifically on their relationship between the u.s. and russia certainly an interesting exchange over the weekend between the two leaders thema lyman writer and host of the progressive radio news hour if you. all right so let's talk now about something that's been going on in new york city this is a program you've probably heard about we've certainly talked about it here before but it seems to be expanding and also getting more attention this is the new york's police department surveillance program which was created quote to keep the city safe from terrorism but what ended up happening is that quite a few innocent muslims have been targeted information about where they shop about

the businesses they own tracked and kept written down a lot of people are starting to look at the program and say you know in a lot of cases what is going on here is entrapment trying to get people to take part in or help plan things to then turn them in and arrest them so a whole lot of new yorkers don't see a problem with what's going on when asked if the n.y.p.d. has been effective in combating terrorism eighty two percent of people say yes and when asked if the n.y.p.d. has unfairly targeted muslims or to combat terrorism just twenty nine percent say yes so at least when it comes to the p.r. war the n.y.p.d. appears to be winning cyrus mcgoldrick is a civil rights manager for the council on american islamic relations it runs us. first let me just ask you is what's going on here some of these surveillance programs especially in new york and a city in the surrounding areas are these legal. it's a very interesting question i think being born and raised in this country i hesitate to conflate law with morality in the country where slavery and segregation

was legal but it's a question that we all have to deal with now when we investigate this program absolutely i think we're just going to want to test it that's for sure i know that is that people on the inside have started to come out including an axe informant a man named craig until he came forward and basically said he was given the green light to do whatever it took he was working in california he converted to islam spent hours and hours every day at the mosque recorded conversations on his key chain and even was told that it was no problem was fine to have sex with women in able to in order to be able to record their pillow talk so as a result of him acting suspicious numbers of the orange county muslim community in california actually reported him and got a restraining order against him what do you think it says that people are starting to come out and tell these stories about what they were allowed to do. i think it's really important all of this because one thing you mentioned was the propaganda and

another thing that's very important is entrapment when you look at the number of the over a dozen terrorism quote unquote terrorism cases that have happened since nine eleven that were foiled by the f.b.i. or the n.y.p.d. look at every single one of those cases where you listen to craig montel or whether you read the transcripts from places like the newburgh four from for honeys case that's ongoing right now you can see that the radicalizes and this is a term is very common here now in counterterrorism work the radicalizes in our mosques are the n.y.p.d. and the f.b.i. informants across the board one hundred percent of the time is unbelievable and for them to be not just stopping crimes because this is not with this is about their manufacturing fronts they're manufacturing the idea of the muslim menace and it's translating into counterterrorism dollars coming to new york city i think one of the arguments that i hear quite often is that you know if people associate what happened on nine eleven and they say well this happened in muslim countries that we

need to do more investigating we need to do more intelligence gathering in mosques around this country do you think that that is just blanket wrong or do you think that the way that they're going about it is wrong. oh absolutely i think on all accounts there are many ways they could have approached the issue of picking up the pieces from nine eleven i think the majority of the hijackers were saudi arabian but that was didn't seem to be the identity that was most salient to the media but i think the law here it's my understanding the law here says that you cannot open files on citizens or anyone here to be honest any law abiding people ness is specific evidence of a crime being committed specific evidence of a crime that's not what's going on here if you look at the n.y.p.d. documents that have led to the associated press reporting look at the demographics unit the powerpoint presentation from the n.y.p.d. describing this they were doing this based on twenty nine ancestries of interest twenty eight was some authority countries and the twenty nine thousand the american black muslim they're looking first signifiers of religious observance of political activity and i think even about evidence of

a crime or leads being mentioned at all that's not what i pay tax dollars to the police to do this is obviously about criminalizing faith criminalizing the sense and control how is this made an impact in mosques around new york city i mean are people more worried to be frightened anyone is this is a really big concern still. absolutely i've heard this from a number of people me on a little bit more outspoken about my own views because i've got a committed to this but on the other hand there are lots of people who come forward and said that they're uncomfortable talking about politics that they're uncomfortable even talking about with lucian and their religious beliefs with people that they don't know with people outside of the family people even distrusting other family members who have worked for the police department or for the f.b.i. or the counterterrorism agencies because people don't feel safe we see people disappearing we see people being convicted of terrorism crimes when there's no evidence of a crime being committed whatsoever this is fundamentally devastating the fabric of this country and is it's one manifestation is right here in the muslim community in

new york city but it's happening not just us but in many communities many of the active communities and political communities around the country as cyrus in my introduction to you i put up the results of a poll that was conducted and basically what we saw is that eighty two percent of people in new york think that the n.y.p.d. is doing its job and talk to me i mean what do you think that's fun. well on the one hand very glad that our constitution is not subject to a simple majority because i think the majority of this country supported slavery the majority of this country supported segregation even the in terms of japanese during world war two was supported by the supreme court and it took fifty years for them to get an apology and reparations from that but on the other hand i think that propaganda is absolutely a part of this work for the n.y.p.d. the headlines the steady supply of headlines that they're entrapment operations have provided certainly keeps people living in fear every time that they are faced

they are on the court on their heels they're faced with another n.y.p.d. document another damning document about just showing that this is the definition of ethnic and religious profiling they trot out one more bogeyman they put up another picture of a muslim and they say that we're here to keep you safe from this and what they're doing is using the fear of islam i think they're using the fear of islam to get to all of your civil rights to the rest of america civil rights and unfortunately it's working and certainly targeting muslims was the centerpiece of the surveillance program but it turns out it's not just muslims the associated press reports that the n.y.p.d. is also doing the same with a lot of liberals in new york city with undercover cops sent to collect information at meetings held by peaceful liberal activists apparently they're taking that information they've created a database on certain readers and the protests across america that they're planning what do you think about this i mean how is this a logical one. it is really not

a big surprise i think a lot of the times this is treated as a revelation i think a lot of us already do this not just based on personal complaints but just based on common sense honestly the details of this program it would sound like cliched fiction if we didn't have the documents to prove it from the police department itself amazing i think was bad enough when it was religious leadership was bad enough when it was college students it was bad enough when it was alimentary students who were being surveilled by a video camera but now that it is any peaceful protest group anybody that would dare challenge the violent status quo that exists has been surveilled and there have files being kept on them based on nothing more than peaceful political or sometimes religious behavior i don't know how this is allowed to go on hopefully the report that came out last week will start to wake people up remind them this is not about keeping them safe this is not about keeping the muslims at bay this is about control this is about criminalizing dissent not only do the ends not justify the means but the means don't even make sense for the ends that were allegedly trying to achieve it i really don't know what it's going to take and it is

interesting i know when the police commission commissioner ray kelly was questioned about it he said the fault of the associated press the a.p. is targeting the police department so it's always interesting the spin machine at work when you keep an eye on it mcgoldrick a civil rights manager for the council on american islamic relations thanks so much . thank you kristen. still ahead on r.t.e. they've got all of capitol hill in their hands power hungry lobbyists are redrawing the nutrition charts and restructuring congress in the process that story next.

mr. mayor good. luck and they alone are still you know there's a real headline that none of them are the problem with the mainstream media today is that they're completely disconnected from the viewers and what actually matters to those viewers and so that's why don't people just don't watch t.v. anymore if they want news they go online and read it but we're trying to take those stories that people actually care about and transfer them back to t.v. . let's talk about obesity it has been a major problem for many children across america for years now and a lot of people look for solutions the government now stands accused of turning a blind eye to a trend that's causing diabetes and heart disease but it's spells profit for giant food corporations party correspondent marine important iowa take a look. it's

a super sized crisis impossible for america to kick in skies and insatiable love for food and big portions has served up a nationwide majority of overweight children none of us wants this future for our kids as first lady michelle obama attempts to tackle the epidemic by advocating more exercise healthy eating and penning a book about the white house garden u.s. lawmakers are getting kudo's first story now how problem her effort to join a poor innocent or well known tension fear will go nowhere given the allure of the food her recent decision by the congress to say pizza was a vegetable you heard correctly the greasy cheesy cheap meal known as pizza is served as a lunch table to thirty two million public school children how because u.s. department of agriculture guidelines while of two tablespoons of tomato paste as an

official veggie serving in november u.s. congress rejected a request from the department that would have changed arguments and ultimately removed from school menus congress has really shown who controls them and that's the big corporations and the big food corporations companies like con agra and these are the makers of the frozen pizza and they have huge financial interests in that obviously ok we're going to publish reports food companies spend five point six billion dollars this year lobbying specifically to keep pizza friendly u.s.d.a. guidelines in place this social consequence of overweight kids has millions currently battling diabetes and millions more vulnerable to heart disease and shortened life expectancy we know that one in three children are obese or overweight in this country one in five four year olds are over actually which is astounding and the fact that car. gris is not willing to change the food policy in

our school cafeterias to benefit the health of our children is really appalling granted issues such as preferred control and obesity are not new problems for america but over the years a hunger for profits has compromised the health of an entire generation the u.s. department of defense says twenty five percent of young americans are too overweight to join the military and that the damage is so that experts say it's a threat to national security. our shores but quite totally unscientific poll found americans picking logic over the world of their lawmakers like pizza. he doesn't want it to mean you know.

we try to it's serious or that's that's that's not that's what it's like it's much better. that's what. that's what the nutritional value in this. period whatever it is i don't think whatever they're being in. this terrible knowing that u.s. leaders have a hand in cooking up being greedy and can also leave a bad taste in many mouths. artsy new york michael let's talk about this about how lobbyists may be fattening up the american public and their own wallets in the process so let's bring in christopher coke he's the author of the book diet for a dead planet. all right chris let's talk about this relationship between food and political and corporate control control what's going on here. well this is a long developing story for decades now corporations are beginning more and more control over the american food supply on the global food supply and we're now at

a situation where for instance just four companies control almost eighty five percent of the entire meat supply in america today and across the board processed food chicken pork breast for companies controlling forty to fifty percent or sixty percent of the entire market just around that out wal-mart itself takes in a quarter of every grocery dollar spent in the united states today so it's a phenomenal level of control and therefore these really outrageous yet you know almost comical but really sad stories about the food lobby trying to pieces of it will really come as an extension of this corporate an economic power and political power these companies have yes certainly one of the big stories that's a couple weeks ago was ground beef in this country and how a lot of it was filled with pink slime and why does that you know why is that allowed to happen well it turns out that

a lot of people in washington are friends with lobby i mean how common is this connection or. it will it's actually an demick to the political and policy making system so for instance you know explore the slot in my book the development of regulations around like meat processing both on the on the food safety as well as the labor side the workers who are it willingly factories these are things that are decided often by the lobbies that pressure the government to say we don't want to slow down the assembly line because you know it's a low profit margin industry and the only way that we can make a profit is. lowering regulations eating up labor then we get all the injuries on the assembly line these rudely exploited workers and we get consumer health scares you know illnesses coming in. out of poison need another cuisine foods you know and we're talking about one hundred billion dollars a year probably more now in medical costs coming out of criminally really. and

so what's happening is the industry. you know both on a regular basis and especially in this case we're talking about pizza as a vegetable in schools. you know they're basically socializing the costs of the costs to diminishing their own costs that's what i mean you know i live here in washington the power of lobbyist is no secret and you know when we hear about lobbyists for big oil companies for big tobacco i think that to me is a little bit easier to swallow but i've got to say i'm somewhat surprised when we talk about children and children's health i mean most people have children and it just seems crazy that this can happen time and time again that more people are not outraged about it and turn away the money and turn away the campaign contributions that they get to speak up and give a voice to kids that attend our public schools here well i agree i mean it's an outrage on the face of it and it needs to be some real real situation and i think

that it has to go beyond you know the pink slime and the pizza or just. gins place islamic problem and the fact is they have made over the tree you know the food industry has become big business like anything else and they are deeply embedded in the political structure both with their lobby groups in europe or talked about how much they spend on lobbying each year and also on the regulatory you know in the in the guts of policy itself they have tremendous effect on things that end up costing all of us money thing us our future it's our kids' health is the future of the country never mind why can't people be in the military or not can people function and thrive in this. was an interesting statistic. a fourth of people who want to be in the military are just too obese to do so i want to ask you chris what do you think the biggest offenders are in terms of taking part in

this and what can even be done to stop them yeah i mean i don't like to pick on just one or two companies i pick on the entire industry in my book and in my writing but you know the big names in terms of the lobbying come down to companies like tyson foods cargill which is a multinational food export or grain export or. you know kraft foods is high on the list pepsi you know we think it's just pepsi but they are not. all kinds of monsanto which controls the very beginning of the food to play with seeds so these are companies again that have phenomenal control over the food supply the grocery store most of the products are anywhere from five to companies. you know and when you have that kind of consolidation that's when the lobbying start to have that kind of influence in washington as well and just real briefly chris i mean but what's next what's the next scare that we're going to see next scandal regarding

food as a result of these lobbyists well just keep on the lookout for them to continue protecting their interests whether it's around junk food or you know they don't want whole foods to be in school lunches because they think it's more expensive anything that's going to further their bottom line in terms of processed food like pizzas readymade burgers things like that i would be very vigilant and this is all very welcome and it's not just opinion this is fact that this is what they do they protect their bottom line the problem is that this is not in the interests of public health kids' health the future of our country of course and so we need to you know. one of the most popular arguments that i always see especially when there's you know local elections and things about you know soda and public schools and things like that is one of the arguments is always like we don't want the government telling us what we can and can't eat lots of interesting stuff here we appreciate you helping us get to the bottom of it christopher.