life. video on demand parties mine broadcasts and r.s.s. feeds upon of your. question. hello kevin owen here in moscow tonight with the top stories from r.t. the syrian government says yes to kofi announce peace plan for a negotiated end to the bloody conflict that's calling opposition leaders seek a unified front against the assad regime. guarantees or an arms race a clear choice is delivered by dmitri medvedev to washington over its missile defense system in europe but says the russian president summed up the results of the nuclear summit in seoul. but it's not the summits agenda that grabbed the media's attention so much. capitol hill but

a conversation between know that if it wasn't supposed to go public i've got more of that in half an hour on the rest of the headlines today. but now just a heads back to d.c. and more from alona. will lose. its technology innovation all the news developments from around russia we've got the future covered. i let's talk about the revolving door favorite topic of ours here on the show because well every politician and especially presidential candidates well let's wax poetic about how they're going to stop it just always seem to keep on spending and a roll call article published earlier today shed light on just how it turns out that several obama administration officials have been coached by k.

street lobbying firms in just the past few weeks a pro boy former congressman harman executive left the public sector to lobby for yahoo and previn griffis kevin gryphus former senior advisor to the chief of staff he's our principal for the protesting group which is a very influential lobbying firm here in d.c. and if you are just following in the footsteps of other executive branch employees who recently quit the federal government to join the influence industry wants former administration officials enjoyed p.r. consultants as knickerbocker and bersin mart sellers and to lobby on behalf of facebook google entergy planned parenthood and group health cooperative and as we discussed a few weeks ago on the show it goes the other way to see for shetty a former bigwig k. street lobbyists he joined joe biden staff as an adviser i normally that kind of thing might not be such a big deal right ok good citizens are used to seeing lobbyists corporate executives staffers and politicians all the world through the revolving door but it becomes an issue when it threatens the obama administration's basic credibility especially

during election season as you know the president repeatedly boasted during the last campaign that his administration would limit its sense of k.-street just take a look at candidate obama's campaign rhetoric in two thousand and eight. they would like but my point is they were. the american people. indeed when president obama first took on. office he issued an executive order that sorts of business to buttress limits on to lobbyist influence and order known as the pledge but double the time that former executive officials are allowed to lobby their old colleagues for one year or two and of her bids former obama administration officials from lobbying their former agencies for the entirety of his administration and its roll call pointed out the rules don't really do much to stop former administration

officials from lobbying congress well the pledge is impressive public interest advocates has been derided and completely knocked the insiders one lobbyist when asked by roll call about the pledge said when you need to get around it get around it it's a joke and everyone knows it's a joke now one thing that obama administration officials who aspire to be lobbyists could do a you simply don't register as a lobbyist just a few weeks ago trade group wrote a letter to the president accusing his white house of publicly criticizing lobbyists on the one hand and on the other hand accepting a lobbyist masquerading as advisors in consultants there's also that little thing about the twenty percent rule on capitol hill that if you only lobby twenty percent of the time you didn't have to register turns out that little rule is self in forest and so since itself in force it's really just become a free for all of their of the white house also wrote a loophole into the pledge saying that it could waive the two year wait wait sickly whenever it suited them but that shouldn't be surprised anyone either because from

the start of his presidency barack obama has embraced officials aren't exactly k. street versions. newly installed treasury secretary timothy geithner appointed mark paterson and this is a former top lobbyist for goldman sachs this is chief of staff and then last week there was a lot of buzz over william lynn he was appointed the number two position at the defense department where you're lynn also a former top lobbyist for raytheon which is a one of the five largest defense contractors so how is that a change in what washington works and how washington works well it's not a change. now to be fair voters didn't expect president obama to fully heed lobbyists of day after all the reality is that many are extremely qualified to work in the public sector and so the point is not the every lobbyist out there is some evil villain it's just the hypocrisy of the extent to which president obama has embraced business as usual was pretty astounding given his campaign rhetoric according to the website open secrets dot org the revolving door my end of spinning

more during the obama administration than it did during the george w. bush presidency five hundred thirty eight officials went from the executive branch to the private sector or vice versa during bush's eight years in the white house and in a little more than three years three hundred and forty two obama officials have taken trips to that revolving door so might not just one up bush when it comes to the war on terror and civil liberties but looks like maybe the revolving door as well. well this weekend the reason rally took over the national mall here in washington d.c. billed as the largest gathering the cycle of movement in world history national are part national mall part service estimated over thirty thousand people were in attendance and despite the rain the participants waited for hours to see speakers like richard dawkins and savage so we have to ask of the largest gathering in history of atheists humanists secularists freethinkers skeptics whatever it is that you like to call them what does it really mean i was being more open minded society

or judging by the rhetoric that comes from g.o.p. candidates legislation is being brought up in states across the country as the tension between the religious and the not only growing joining me to discuss this is lawrence krauss foundation professor of the school of earth and space exploration and director of the origins project at arizona state university is also author of a universe from nothing why there is something rather than nothing lawrence want to thank you for joining us tonight and you know you spoke at this rally over the weekend tell me what you think the reason for it was why did we see the largest gathering in history oh i do think people are i've been of rule of reason i've been concerned by the level at which religious rhetoric has begun to play a role in this campaign but more importantly that i think they want to make it clear and maybe these kind of things will begin to make it clear that there actually are other voting blocs in the country besides the right wing conservative christian voting bloc but there actually are significant number of people at least fourteen

or fifteen percent of the public they claim to have no religious affiliation that's a lot of people and and those people tend not to vote as a block i'm certain issues like abortion or things like that but they do they are interested in fact in public policy based on reason instead of myth or superstition and that level of rhetoric in the campaign i think is one of the reasons why it seems so we will come out. of this event aside if i. it was fun. and it was there was there were comedians and musicians and and i had a lot of interesting talk about the atmosphere as wonderful as it between before i talked on stage i walked around and was and was meeting with people and it was and there was a lot of enthusiasm about the notion and it's why would you need it it's kind of amazing that you need to rally suggest that public policy should be based on reason and a pyrrhic eleventh's you shouldn't need that and in the best of all possible worlds but what we make clear is we don't live in the best of all possible worlds right

now i am and you have a lot of people out there they constantly want to go back to you know the certain morals that neither of the founding i believe is grounded in and so i don't think it's even worse than that they make claims that are just so obviously in it in opposite to the evidence of reality i mean ridiculous claims like the fact that there prenatal care or birth control some on courage abortion or the claim that public policy should be based on the on the presumption that the united states is battling satan i mean that's kind of really worrisome when you think that that might be governing the policy of a potential candidate for president but i'll go with you there that that i think it's pretty worrisome when it comes to the policies of certain candidates i put in place but so what do you think that the breakdown is there should we grill you know as i was looking at an interview with richard dawkins the other day to you and he thought that we should really grill our presidential candidates about their certain personal beliefs and about certain things that you might see you know in the bible

and see if you believe in that or should stay private and then you have different beliefs they're supposed to come out into the public realm well richard live talk about that and you may have been watching a conversation he and i have had when we talk about in public as well as private and i think the point is if the religious beliefs were clearly private and didn't impact on behavior and in fact campaign said maybe that would be the case but. it's not the case we live in a world where in fact the candidates have to ask to trumpet their religious beliefs no matter how silly and in that case it seems to me it's open territory and absolutely you have to ask yourself a question about the character and well and rationalism in a skepticism of someone who is willing to believe that you know it rick santorum is off scale so i don't think we have to discuss him he's clearly a nut but. you might take mitt romney who seems more result but he's already you

know he the mormon church is based on this ridiculous notion that this known con men discovered gold and golden tablets under a tree and somehow translated them into seventeenth century english in the nineteenth century and and that and in fact as romney is there that you know jesus will come back and reign half the time in jerusalem and half the time in missouri i mean these are the. i do think since the candidates trumpet their religion but that becomes fair game i mean if they trumpeted their sex lives i suppose that would be fair game to they don't and maybe that's what a good reason to leave it alone but i don't it's not an utterance do you think atheists have to push for more because you mentioned that there is this voting bloc they don't necessarily unison but democratic politicians also all have to go out and prove that they are religious people we've seen the exact same thing happen with president obama i think there's only one member of congress that is openly atheist and so. is the atheist voting block going to have to become more vocal are

they supposed to become like the conservative right and start scaring their politicians i hope not scaring but the point is that their way it's obvious as richard has said the statistically it's clearly impossible that only one member of congress is you know doesn't have a religious belief but in the current climate you can't talk about that and people are in fact afraid and there's a good reason a recent psychological study of by psychologist in canada the united states looked at that voters' perceptions out of for students and adults and in fact the group that is most distrusted. was atheists they were on par with rapists and that's kind of amazing because all the atheists are doing or are questioning religion i mean we should be we should be revering questioning in our society and our reviling it and so i think there are tons of people who are afraid to talk about this and if they're open rallies like this where people can see lots of people come out and there and not just one member of congress but former members of congress and some

hollywood stars and and then maybe people will become less afraid about saying you know it's or to question silly beliefs and in fact more importantly it's all right i took command bet silly beliefs don't impact on public policy are bad so how do you keep it from going from questioning believes the you think are silly to you ridicule and showing contempt because that is one of the things that richard also said when he was. well i think to some extent. you know ridicule is one of the ways to make something bring up porton question out public i mean comedians do it all the time satirist do it all the time and i think the amazing thing about ridiculing religion is it seems so shocking how dare we ridicule religion but in fact why does religion have a special place why is it no more subject to ridicule then saw in sore politics and i think what what richard is suggesting and maybe it's necessary for some people to

do this is to consciousness raise is to suggest that you know nothing is above ridicule at some level and ridicule is a very effective form of satire at some level and it just points out the police are beliefs but they're nothing if you'll forgive the pun nothing is sacred when it comes to so ideas i was things like why there are you know thirty thousand other people agree with you on the island this weekend lawrence thanks so much for joining us thanks again you take care. it's time for a last break for the evening turns out the passing discriminatory and illegal immigration laws are pretty expensive secure our schools have one city out there whose laws cost it over five million dollars the town takes and i'm happy our thanks to our cousins out here in times of poor and drones delivering tacos could be coming to your space near you and.

the exists. to. elude you. would. mind in russia would be soon which bryson if you knew about sound from phones to

freshen movies. from stunts on t.v. don't comb. all right guys it's time for tonight's tool time award and tonight we're giving it to the farmers branch texas city council here last week the fifth u.s. circuit court of appeals ruled the farmers branch law regarding immigration housing regulations was unconstitutional and according to the associated press city officials and farmers branch say they will likely press on defending the law and he farmers branch texas started on the path to immigration infamy in two thousand and six when they first tried to impose a law against renting to undocumented immigrants i love was repealed in two thousand and seven after the law was challenged in federal court by the a.c.l.u. and so in two thousand and eight the current version of the law was drafted and

passed and the newer version attempts to require all renters to have a city license and have legal status of any applicant to be checked now that new less illegal law has been snared in legal battles of its own sense of past so far date the legal battles cause farmers branch taxpayers four point five million dollars while the cost is staggering especially since it's the burden felt by the taxpayers of a single city farmer's grange is far from the only community taking the economic hit for passing laws that many say are discriminatory and plain old unconstitutional and you all remember arizona's controversial as ten seventy well that one cost over a million dollars to the state legal fees four hundred ninety million dollars and tourism revenue and that's after more than three million dollars were raised privately by a fund that governor jan brewer set up in south carolina their immigration law caused at least one point three million so i guess that farmers branch texas can feel better knowing that they aren't alone in the throwing money down the toilet

club and time and time again we hear this argument as justification for why these laws are needed. they can. barter is granted the price tag the legislation is transferred to the citizens and last for years the city has had to cut salaries and benefits due to financial strain but just remember this legislation is for the citizens to save their jobs so what are a few benefits and flash salaries in the end right now this is what it's really all about is making sure that american jobs aren't really still and when documented immigrants with i'll tell you i mean it's not like it's been proven that americans won't do the jobs that are left behind oh wait that's right it has by the millions of dollars worth of crops that rotted in georgia after they passed their controversial immigration law so they pay bills game the city absolutely nothing that's cost taxpayers millions of dollars and been declared unconstitutional so you

think that the farmers branch city council would cut their losses right away with their tails between their legs right not so fast a member of the farmers branch legal team for this case however falling to say about the ruling they said this opinion they exist for further review really further review what shocked me but that quote is from chris cole back and when he's not advising the farmers branch city council on the lawsuit he's working on legislation at least similar in fact in arizona nebraska texas missouri pennsylvania and idaho the one that's still not it he also advises romney on immigration actually he's a master high and mastermind behind this reasoning over time people will find it less attractive to be here if they can't find work here some are for the self deportation. now it is not to sound like an immigration policy that every american get behind let's all make americas so miserable for anybody who looks like they shouldn't be here and they don't want to be here in man that really sounds like a country that i want to raise my kids in but back to farmers branch it's obvious

that they've fallen into callbacks self deportation trap keep the documented population from having a place to live and the leap i wonder if they knew that self-supporting the community there was going to cost them almost five million dollars so are being a pawn in kovacs nationwide war on undocumented immigrants and wasting millions of dollars in taxpayer money to fund legislation that is discriminatory unconstitutional the farmers branch city council is tonight's bull's-eye what are. our guides time for happy hour and joining me this evening r t producer jenny churchill and jim hansen retired special operations master sergeant and military blogger a black buy dot net hey guys. let's talk a little bit more than two arms out he may claim to be a religious. man but he gets really angry just like as angry face me gets into it

with a new york times reporter. you can use the word for public i'm trying to give the rock obama on the issue of health care because he fashioned the blueprint i've been saying it in every speech we're distorting our words. i see it. it's. c'mon man what are you doing. so he's the only they read like i believe you're going to hell cow and he's like it but can we play the next clip as to how he doubled down on this do you think alike . if you haven't cursed out a new york times reporter during the course of the campaign you're not really a republican is the way i look at it. i mean you know that it was just sort of these harassing moments you know after after having to answer the question a few times and you know sort of comes back with the same old question the same old spin and i just said ok i've had enough of this. you haven't cut out you're not

a real republican yeah the family values party you haven't downing you're not a higher up almost got carpal tunnel syndrome from the number of b.s. flags out at a throw in the new york times that makes him a red blooded american i didn't like santorum too much until this little. do i know i could get behind him but i can at least like the fact that he has that he i think that he was absolutely correct in calling out the reporter i mean he was misquoting him and it was actually ridiculous i don't want to defend santorum i usually try i think here he was justified now when they're not back as long imagine he's like china to most of them if you're not a real republican if you haven't actually must find out i think that you're here paul got them to do they voted republican requoted they call have done it in private that's good and i think i think that is display of emotions also might show that rick santorum might be too emotional to be on the river. compared to mitt

romney have any great thank you and we think. ok. let's move on to somebody who didn't make it he left the campaign trail through most hurricane is still around out of emotion or the right view to so easy crazy. so basically he has a new being talking about the stimulus tax policy and just make up as we are about . this is small business and did that her cat scan. any question. probably the video is actually been pulled from their you grave it was oh they actually back up but i have some questions actually a little girl. leaving a little girl you any questions yes thank you i actually have many questions from

that video i want to know was this a money inspired you know i'm a little confused we've got the evil rabbit flying through the catapults i'm a little lost i don't know whether or not it's a good thing that the rabbit was killed because of i find it attacked and i have the answers ok there was a cow coming over the castle wall yet the rabbit was on the ground and i think this was history the world remember where the king was having the presence of the king we pulled them all he was taken out of here but then all kinds of references but i'm assuming no one's going to say the small business is. raising business like a little child actually i hate small business. corporations. so i think the meaning was lost somewhere in the craziness yeah yeah that's so surprising you're saying the important points were lost in the crazy i bet some rays are going to tell you how to retain i don't know really shocking maybe. more

than cigarettes. political ads. let's hear them across our this would have a clip for it but this is this is pretty interesting i mean we talk about throwing you this we talk about domestic drone use all the time because it's coming soon they just the president signed this new f.a.a. bill and so i think that by two thousand and thirteen they have to have all of the new regulations in place. so it looks like taco drones are going to be coming your way one played out in talk o. copter is a startup company which has a business model where you order your talk on your smartphone and also have beem in your g.p.s. location information and basically you will get your talk was delivered to you lying little mini robot they can't do it yet there's a big governments in their way because there aren't you know the rules for commercial use of drones yes but i can't help but feel like this is like a joint effort by all government entities to show the softer side of drones like oh you're against drones but if they were you talk about this is that going to change

your mind and we're going to leave through that illegal immigrants while they're doing it and double down there's got to be a way to go there usually secure so they should only the immigrants they steal the immigrants tacos they bring you the talent and racially profiled immigrants would be improper i guess jennie's racist you are racist and it was really you know if you want something where you got those years ago and loaded us up all right well i do not condone taco droughns or any other kind i think it kicks i don't i just don't really see it working i don't think it's really going to function but like i said any kind of delivery of you know it's easier to crunch down are you guys are going to wrap it up exaggerating tonight that's it for tonight's show thank you for keeping an admiration of my tomorrow certainly weisman from the atlantic is going to be joining us to talk about why young people just aren't buying cars anymore or the auto industry is trying to do about it and we're trying to forget become a fan of you on the show on facebook and follow us on twitter there's anything you ever missed you can catch it on youtube dot com blacula michelle and me up next is

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