same saxon for example are going in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture. the streets of chicago are filled with activism in calls to end the wars in promote more wealthy equality we'll have the latest on occupy nato and how the police are using their millions of dollars worth of riot gear to silence free speech also the crackdown on both citizen and credentialed journalists has been a common theme since the occupy movement kicked off last fall and it's the same story in chicago so whatever happened to a free and open press in america one of our nation's fundamental rights and later

the chairman of the nuclear regulatory commission is stepping down from his position so what does this mean especially with a nuclear crisis continue in japan and plants in the united states getting older and older. and we begin tonight with what's going on in chicago after spending fourteen million dollars preparing to host the any will nato summit including one million dollars alone for chicago police to arm themselves with riot gear the city of chicago came face to face with on the street activism and the occupy movement this weekend and today despite warnings that frenzied occupiers would turn violent in the streets of chicago would devolve into the chaos seen back in one nine hundred sixty eight when police clash with them in strangers outside the democratic national convention this weekend's demonstrations against it were filled with peaceful rallies and well coordinated marches. but there were still these forty

five people arrested yesterday and numerous reports of citizen journalists being intimidated detained interrogated and even arrested with absolutely no probable cause and despite the million dollar investment in riot gear and high tech crowd control weapons like long range acoustic devices police often relied on their own bikes to beat back peaceful demonstrators. gets too close and you get a huffy tired to the face and here's what i have another group of citizen journalists when they were stopped by the chicago p.d. with guns drawn for no apparent reason.

for being raided right now for those that are watching we have a right to buy the c.p.d. as we speak. what is it and what is this for a month and a lot that i got off of money my findings not so well some today are applauding chicago police is restraint mainly because the streets didn't turn into an all out war zone as we saw in oakland a few months back there's a number of demonstrators who can tell a much different story join me now as one of the individual seen in the video we just played timbales a journalist in occupy wall street participant in the brain behind him cast of the best ustream sites out there following the movement tim welcome to the show. i don't necessarily consider myself or movement i'm just a journalist for the story ok all right thanks tim first off we just saw the video when you were you guys were in the car explain kind of what happened. both leading

up to that and after the after the feed there. we got word early in the game that the place we've been staying at and surrounded by police. and so we're kind of freaked out we didn't know how to handle the situation one of the members of my team just had gone to the apartment and found the back door was open the alarm was going off and he had reason to believe someone was inside and so he ended up leaving but he said you know our commitment fine as we were leaving the march we were worried that our equipment been tampered with not the reason that we didn't know why no one contacted us from our anything like that we're trying to figure out what to do as we're pulling up to a stop sign about six or seven vehicles surrounded us and they came out here and you know hands the begin to show. justin who was sitting in the middle so that as soon as he saw the guns from when he shot his camera that's like the camera. and they immediately pulled us out of the car popped us and started interrogating us

great they were lead to. loop liberty mccaskey is a live broadcast footage they don't need at that and they. you only get audio so they told us that the reason it stopped us was that vehicle we were in matched the description they were looking for and even though they admitted the mistake. they didn't tell you to interrogate us about where we were staying last great address what we were doing we're working with anyone else and they went through the vehicle took some of our current were banging around i don't know why and. ultimately leaving there were there was a you know black s.u.v. with lightweights i'm not sure what kind of agency that was so i saw the whole thing was ultimately. the thought you were driving some suspect vehicle which seems like something that could make a point a body over it have you talked to other journalists or you know of and were subject to similar sort of random stops an intimidation tactics. yes two of my friends that

were current and they were to change the summer hours i heard that one of luke's friends was detained in a d.h.s.s. only six hours and interrogated about whereabouts he was. there's there's a story that broke last week of three people who were arrested by stupidity on terrorism charges for molotov cocktails the lawyer for the three people says this is a classic set up this is entrapment it was officers that had infiltrated and basically set these guys up to even the molotov cocktails even. as far as you know about the movement are they prepared for the sort of infiltration the sort of set up and what kind of precautions are being taken in regard to that i don't know about any precautions it's a really hard thing to deal with you know i can't speak about the specifics of the case i you know i wasn't there i don't know people who were involved you know

a lot of people on the fence as to whether or not they were actually making deals but you also have to realize how difficult and yourself against false accusations it is right on cycle bence's frets it's very easy for the police to just make the accusation charges we've seen all throughout the occupy and near you know majority of people arrested or charged and resisting video clearly shows that he's fully cooperating so you know it's hard to say yes it is hard to say not to mention it seems like every every arrest for a suspected terrorist that we've seen over the last few months has been a case of police finding some disaffected individual setting them up giving them the bomb giving them plans in arresting them right when he's about to carry out the tactics temple were out of time thanks a lot for coming on thank you very much. the crackdown on citizen journalists and credentialed journalists life has been a common theme since the occupy movement kicked off last fall since then seventy

five journalists affiliated or just covering occupy have been arrested that might explain one reason why our nation's press freedom rankings have plummeted according to the latest study done by freedom house which examines press freedoms of nations all around the world the u.s. now ranks twenty second in press freedom tied with a stone and jamaica for a nation that considers its most fundamental right the very first right in fact a free and open press and this is pretty troubling news tim carr joins me now he is senior strategy director with free press dot net tim welcome hi sam how are you intend thanks a lot for coming on first of what's your take on how journalists were treated over the weekend and today in chicago well it's part of a pattern of abuse that we've seen since the very first days of the occupy wall street movement and the number that you cited seventy five journalists was the number that i reported on before this weekend's events at the nato summit and the

number is now eighty five journalists arrested that we have been tracking so the number has grown it's an ongoing pattern. that's happening with more frequency is more people. become journalists it's a lot easier today to get the means to report on these types of events so so you're seeing more of those people on the streets and as a result you're seeing more of these types of arrests well as you just said more people are becoming journalists and that's a lot has to do with smartphones we now see the rise of anyone with a smartphone basically can be a citizen journalist people like tim poll who we just interviewed should this broad expansion of who journalists is nowadays which you know as i said to me anyone complicate press freedoms in america. it should not i mean the first amendment extends to everyone and increasingly as we've seen this sort of ubiquity of cell phones we've seen more of these types of citizen journalists who take the street and tim is a perfect example he has tens of thousands of loyal viewers who who log into his

cell phone stream essentially he is a live stream or streams from a cell phone device that he holds in his hands for hours on end and people prefer that kind of raw unedited view of the news to the more produced and polished news that a lot of the mainstream news networks provide and in most cases those mainstream networks their journalists aren't even there so if you really want to see what's happening on the front lines of these protests you do have to go to the citizen journalists who are who are reporting this type of news right and in some states filming police is legal in other states there's laws against filming police but the justice department just sent a letter to the baltimore police department where it's illegal and said that seizing and destroying recording devices are in violation of first and fourth amendments and a recent federal court ruling found that recording a police officer is a first amendment right will any of these new developments protect citizen journalists moving forward in your opinion. well that's the challenge that we face

it free press so if you know every time the courts or the department of justice attempts to interpret our first amendment rights in the era of cell phones they found for cell phone users that we have a right to record police activities in public spaces the problem that we face right now is getting that information from the courts and from the department of justice into the police departments making sure that those officers who are on the front lines who are out there on the beat understand that when someone records them going about their daily duties that they cannot target that person unfortunately as we saw over the weekend there are still continue to target people they still continue to arrest people and there's an interesting twist of that that that's pertinent to tim poole who was on earlier there was a recent case here in new york city that was thrown out of court because of tim cole's recording he had recorded an arrest of a photographer and found that the police had no grounds to arrest him and upon

presentation of temple's video in the courtrooms they they threw that course that that case out of court so you can see there's a real value to having these people documenting these sorts of things on the street and it's really important for us to to stand up and defend everyone's right to record and make sure that we have the sort of transparency across the system yeah absolutely and it seems like really these citizen journalists have been so beneficial to the movement every time we see an act of police brutality or something like that the movement just grows and grows and grows tim we're all out of time thanks a lot for coming on and car free press dot net thanks sam so without a free press there is no democracy and without a democracy there is nothing left to challenge corporate power and defend the american middle class that's how crucial journalists of all stripes are and why they need to be protected. after the break gregory cochairman of the nuclear

regulatory commission is resigning from his post so what does the departure of the nation's top nuclear watchdog mean for the safety of nuclear power in america. of american power continue. things in our country. might actually be time for a revolution. and it turns out that a procurer drink at starbucks says a surprising. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then. some other part of it and realize that everything you. are welcome is

a big issue. when you. look into the loan itself we'll get the real headlines with none of them are the problem with the mainstream media today is that they're completely disconnected from the viewers and what actually matters so that's why young people 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 in t.v. .

i'm laurie mr. so this is nick. back in two thousand and nine nick was working at a still play in pittsburgh when something went terribly wrong there was a gas leak at the plant that went unnoticed and on the morning of september third that leak was ignited triggering a massive explosion nick was working nearby and was thrown into a still call him killing him instantly the news didn't really pick up the story and no one was jailed for negligence and in the end it still contractor the plant was fined ten thousand dollars for the accident. and it was just one of four thousand five hundred fifty one americans who died on the job that year which is probably

why the news media didn't even bother reporting on it and then several fine for each death was just a mere seven thousand nine hundred dollars that year and then in two thousand and ten even more americans died in the job as a new study by the center for public integrity uncovered four thousand six hundred ninety four thousand six hundred ninety excuse me workers were killed on the job in america in two thousand and ten that's more deaths than on nine eleven that's more americans dead on the job than in ten years of war in iraq the occupational safety and health administration which is in charge of ensuring a safe workplace for all americans is woefully understaffed in fact it would take one hundred thirty years for the administration to inspect every workplace in america to make sure another worker like nick doesn't die for no reason and to make matters worse republicans are proposing slashing the occupational safety and health administration budget by twenty percent last month on april twenty eighth the nation recognize workers memorial day though many around the country don't even realize such a day exists but he was tom's message that day on the need to protect american

workers on the job. we honor several different memorial days throughout the year in the united states we have a memorial day for presidents for icons like martin luther king jr for our soldiers we even have a memorial day for someone like christopher columbus who's authored raped and pillaged his way to glory but on saturday the nation honors a memorial day that is too often overlooked most people don't even know it exists its workers memorial day a day every member ins for working men and women who have been injured diseased or killed on the job and sadly there's a lot of remembering to do in two thousand and ten more than four thousand five hundred american workers were killed by traumatic injuries on the job that's twelve americans dead on the job every single day another fifty to sixty thousand workers died from occupational diseases that year two thousand and ten the consequences of breathing this festus are working with carcinogens in our nation's refineries are

working coal mines are cause black lung these are men and women who are just trying to live their lives and raise their families and in the process of working every business day create wealth for our country make billions for our c.e.o.'s and all too often all too tragically die in the process and tomorrow we remember them for their sacrifices and it's not just about remembering it's about working today's workers and we're in the workers of the future protecting today's workers and the workers of the future as the early american labor leader and co-founder of the industrial workers of the world mary harris jones a.k.a. mother jones said pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living by the jones message has been carried forward in the last hundred plus years as progressive marched picketed been beaten and shot at and killed in the name of working people and their right to a safe workplace. nonetheless they've succeeded over and over again to get crucial

laws passed to protect working americans there was the establishment of a department of labor one hundred thirteen by president woodrow wilson following the triangle shirtwaist factory fire that killed one hundred forty six people in manhattan just two years earlier and a year before the department of labor was created congress passed and president taft republican president taft signed the act of nine hundred twelve protecting more than three thousand match workers people like the matches from phosphorus poisoning in one hundred thirty six president franklin roosevelt signed into law the hall the hall should be the walsh healey public contracts act banning hazardous workplaces from receiving federal contracts but this was just the beginning by nine hundred fifty two the dangers of working in our minds could no longer be ignored and president eisenhower signed into law the federal coal mine safety act of one

hundred fifty two mandating annual inspections of certain underground mines in one hundred sixty six president lyndon johnson expanded them to include inspection of all underground coal mines in the country. that same time president johnson also tried to pass tried to pass the most comprehensive workplace safety law yet with the occupational safety hazard act. and although that act osha failed under pressure from corporations and bought out conservative politicians president richard for a good mix of stepped in to finally push for and sign it in one hundred seventy on april twenty eighth actually the reason why that day was chosen as workers memorial day numbers compiled by the a.f.l.-cio show that millions of american workers have been saved from workplace injuries illness and death as a result of the occupational safety hazard at. so even though the struggle for safe

workplaces has been a difficult and often bloody fight for the last hundred years or so american workers have had some of the tools necessary to stand up to corporate power and bought out politicians and historically for over fifty years democrats and republicans have often stepped up to do what's right to protect workers but today unfortunately republicans don't give a damn about workplace safety anymore in fact in the last year house republicans have push legislation to undo nearly all these accomplishments and workplace safety tea party republicans tea party republicans or the freshmen republicans are right that they got it all figured out right they argued against child labor laws why oh they're unconstitutional and using the phony argument that we can't harm what you know frank one says freeze the so-called job creators can do anything to hurt them republicans are making it harder and harder to pass any kind of new laws or

regulations that might keep the workplace safe for average working people laws and regulations for example the would prevent another massey mine disaster like the one that killed thirty eight workers or would prevent another b.p. oil rig explosion like the one that killed eleven. with the so-called reins act corporate shill republicans want veto power over any new workplace regulations proposed by this president or any president and with the so-called regulatory accountability act decades all the way back to nixon decades of safety regulations would be undone by these tea partiers and future regulations would be justified by how much they would cost corporations rather than how many lives they would protect a century of victories for workplace safety are being up ended right in front of us today just as thousands of americans die on the job because of this or because of

the job every day in this nation and that's why mother jones is a message to pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living is so important on this weekend's workers memorial day workers built this country and they deserve safety in the workplace. in the best of the rest of the news nuclear regulatory commission chairman gregory yachts co is resigning from his post his announcement comes today after months of infighting on the n.r.c. as pro nuclear industry commissioners clash with yachts go on new safety regulations and what to do with yucca mountain. so what does the departure of america's top nuclear watchdog mean that specially with a nuclear crisis still brewing in japan and dozens of aging nuclear plants the united states turning up their own red flags here to offer an answer is kevin

camp's nuclear waste watchdog to add beyond nuclear kevin welcome back to the show i sam thanks for having me thanks for coming on so forbes magazine which is really the place for business leaders talk to business leaders is out with a column today entitled why yachts co is leaving the n.r.c. is good for america so kevin is yachts go leaving good for america not at all it's ironic that forbes would say that because back in the mid eighty's they published a front page article that said nuclear power was the biggest managerial disaster in business history so i guess forbes has. since done but the thing about jaska resigning is he's been under a witch hunt type pressure floor a long time and it's because of his safety advocacy on issues like yucca mountain the proposed national dumpsite is advocacy for safety on things like implementing lessons learned from the fukushima nuclear catastrophe in japan and his votes against new reactors in the u.s.

like a vocal georgia so the industry just cannot abide a chairman of the n.r.c. that would actually oppose it on safety grounds which is what he's done not one hundred percent of the time by any means but more than they like for sure what does that say about the power of the nuclear lobby i mean ryan grim at huffington post is reporting that jasko was basically forced out as a result of a smear campaign by by by a new by industry lobbyist they accused him of being abusive toward women really. vile stuff that was all unfounded. so just how powerful is this lobbying might explain why after the fukushima crisis lots of nations in europe have have tried to cut back on nuclear power eliminated altogether while here in the united states we're looking to expand it. well the nuclear power industry is very powerful at the top levels of the federal government certainly at the nuclear regulatory commission and their lobbyists and their people swarm the agency on a daily basis actually and get away with writing

a lot of the nuclear regulations from their pressure on the and us an agency and it it's true that it's very difficult for an opponent of the industry if not impossible to be appointed a commissioner let alone a chairman of the nuclear regulatory commission and greg ask himself it took from two thousand and three to two thousand and five senator reid battling with president george w. bush to get on the commission in the first place and as i said jasko does not vote our way one hundred percent of the time not at all just recently he voted to block consideration of renewables as an alternative to twenty year license extensions at reactors like seabrook new hampshire davis bessie ohio but like i said he has many votes where he's the sole dissents and the other four commissioners are in lockstep in support of industry another area where he's distinguished himself is on fire protections he's tried to get the agency to do the right thing and they've done the

wrong thing since one nine hundred seventy five in an r.c. on fire protection ok so we're looking probably worst case of complete regulatory capture of the n.r.c. which could lead to some sort of disastrous consequences in thirty seconds we have left. reactor four at fukushima still in really bad shape. very much so one big earthquake at fukushima daiichi could topple the unit four reactor building and inside that pool which is one hundred feet up in the air is one hundred and thirty five tons of high level radioactive waste and once you lose the cooling water supply even if the pools floor fall out which is a risk as well you could have a radioactive inferno within an hour to eight times the radioactive cesium one thirty seven released by chernow bowl there would have to abandon the entire site there are seven pools with eighty five times chernobyl cesium at the fukushima daiichi site you could lose a big chunk of japan if this whole place went up in flames something we have to keep an eye on it unfortunately doesn't look like we're learning the lessons we

should be learning tevin thanks a lot for coming on thank you samples covered beyond nuclear coming up the donald says full steam ahead on the reverend jeremiah wright attacks and paul ryan is more delusional than ever all that and more in tonight's politics panel a client of american power continues. things are so bad. might actually be time for a revolution. and it turns out that a popular drink of starbucks says it's surprising him greedy here. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harkin welcomes a big picture. here

. but in the alone if out they'll get a real headline for that month. 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 young people don't watch t.v. 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. .