remedied the i'm trying. today on r t and the supreme court is sending a stiff message to people who download or illegally share music pay for the music or pay the price of prosecution we'll tell you how one boston university student who has a six hundred fifty seven thousand dollars verdict hanging over his head is fighting back. taking the line of duty to the front lines of the occupy movement retired philadelphia police captain ray lewis has become a ray of light to many of the protesters bringing much needed needed legitimacy to the movement even if that means making sacrifices of his own class captain ray lewis why this taus is so important to him. plus getting a degree in debt american students are walking out of college with more than

a higher education most are racking up major debt problems about to get a lot worse we'll tell you how congress is making students learn about finances the hard way. wednesday may twenty third four pm in washington d.c. i'm at the martin you're watching our t.v. . you'd be hard pressed to find someone who's not guilty of it downloading songs off the internet illegally and when the music industry comes down on a person guilty they come down hard boston university student joel ten bombed down one hundred thirty songs off the internet and shared them one peer to peer networks he was then sued by the recording industry association of america and two thousand and nine a jury ordered him to pay twenty two thousand five hundred dollars for each song he downloaded six hundred seventy five thousand dollars and total even though the penalty was called unconstitutionally excessive by a federal judge it was upheld by the u.s.

circuit court of appeals the request of the monolithic record label industries represented by the r i a to talk more about this classic david versus goliath struggle as joel tenenbaum himself. joel i'm sure that when you downloaded google dolls iris you know you'd be paying over twenty two grand for it so was the guy who were the group of dollars worth of well i won't be i haven't paid anything i don't know that wanted to spend anywhere else and the case isn't over yet it's still pending in the first circuit. you know everyone and their mother has downloaded songs illegally off the internet why do you think that you were targeted joel well it was me in addition to a tens of thousands of other people out of the millions that were doing it and so it was basically just bad chance. why do you think that you were i mean how does it feel to be a scapegoat for the record industry. it doesn't feel good. i

mean they're spending tens of millions of dollars to rain down on my life make it as difficult as possible i'm not happy about that but the fight goes on in the case continues it's nice to have the support that i have and friends and family. joel why do you think that they target and vigils when everyone does this. you know is it just to cause a chilling effect to send a message as the site is saying this could happen to you well you know that's basically the idea there are there are some interesting news articles out and there is. an analyst in the field who says that basically this is a remnant of an earlier age when they just didn't know what to do and they got desperate and started suing now they don't have any fresh lawsuits are coming out of this but this remnant still continues because they want to the rhetorical power of that urban legend of that to make an example out of somebody's show that they can frighten people out of doing it the idea is instead of some kind of regular

enforcement of parking what you do is you just pick someone at random and give them you know the death penalty for a parking ticket and then maybe no one will ever think about doing that again and it is a clear example of the punishment definitely not fitting the crime joel talk a little bit about your case what is happening right now. so the reason this is in the news right now is that the supreme court had denied our. petition for certain requests to hear the case and it is continuing at the that the federal level locally. which is in the first circuit court the first circuit court of appeals overruled judge girders reduction of the damages amount and demanded there remanded that the first circuit district court now go through the military process which ironically was probably what judge burton was trying to avoid the first place because when you branch or medicare which is this common law kind of reduction of things you have to offer the option of a new trial jimmy thomas ras it the case out in minnesota which is very similar to

mine has now been through three trials and that's exactly what happened every minute change offered the r i turned it down and now she has a new trial a new trial a new trial it's groundhog day for her why do you think i mean why do you think that the court overturned this federal judge's ruling i mean it was clearly unconstitutional excessive i said that the sun sells what do you think this shows about the lobbying and history of the hour i. well i don't know exactly mean i hope i'm not one to it to cast aspersions at the judicial system and i imagine the reasoning is rather complicated it does make me lose a certain amount of faith in the legal system that we're continuing to get these kind of nonsense answers but in fairness the r.i. a has a has much more resources. at their at their disposal they have a much more expensive and much more

a talent well not talented legal team but many many more people. and they do have really the best copyright lawyers in the world they've spent tens of millions of dollars. prosecuting the on this so it's a matter of just finding little pieces in the law and arguing them effectively in court which enabled us basically to not release to to mount a defense they were able to strip away all of our expert witnesses and basically all of our testimony when it came time for us to finally present because they're just much better at this than we are joe when you first got targeted were you sent a letter and did you give the option to settle or did you just choose and we're going to fight back against all the charges well they sent a letter in i think it was two thousand and four it was a very kind of big notice that just says we think you're violating our copyrights it wasn't even clear who was from they said pass money. but we didn't know that it wasn't a scam we didn't know what it was and there was certainly no evidence presented so we didn't know what exactly to make of this i did call them up i did offer them

a money order i sent them a money order which they turned down and i applied to them i said i can't pay this and they say ok we'll try our financial hardship program and that turned out to be nonsense then we stopped hearing from them and then one day in the building was august two thousand and seven there was a really large stack of papers that appeared at my apartment doorstep and that was the formal complaint itself. joe why do you think that the these record industry companies do not go after the actual facilitators of this piracy networks and these peer to peer training networks i mean these are people who run these and yet they target people who are the users why do you think that they don't go after the big wigs here. just one more thing i want to finish our coverage of the previous point was that the initial complaint was the amount of fifty to fifty in the pretrial stages i did offer that much money to them by which time they said no you need to

pass twelve thousand plus so i did offer one of their talking points they have a whole list of campaign they have a paid spokesperson whose job it is to basically take shots at me and that's one of their lines but i did offer to pay. it just wasn't enough for them now is your comment about why don't they go after the main distributors well they did initially there was napster was shut down because dogs been shut down lines where there are a lot of you know very notable cases like this but i think the issue is that every time that one got shut down the. another one of the more one pop that sort of the nature of the internet is that information kind of wants to be free and so you have a very hard problem very hard time trying to prevent you from doing so so this hasn't really stopped any kind of file sharing at all it's just driven it further underground now everyone i know just torrents instead of using these big file sharing programs that are more traceable as i said before an illness or app of the segment i mean this is like a final and it's a desperate attempt i mean on one of the record industries i mean people are not

going to stop pirating music and it's not going to happen like you said other file sharing networks are going to pop up if one gets shut down where do you see this all going. and the you know the pi the anti-piracy movement really do think there's a chance or do you think they'll just keep scapegoating people and and their desperation well they claim to have seen the light they claim to have not filed anymore suits that they're just carrying this thing out because i think it would open up so much backlash if it was discovered that this sort of thing against me was was nonsense and i think they've just they've already pushed they've already gone so far with that they try to have to fall they feel like they have to fall through just to feel. a bit less ridiculous in their example but as to where this is going to know exactly i mean i don't like to have this sort of pressure against me. right but i mean the music business will always continue to exist there

is the grateful dead john perry barlow testified if i tried to say that the music business will never cease to exist in some form because it does what we as humans fundamentally need to do which is express ourselves and share art not that. that will always happen and it's jamil year t. that scarcity that creates value and definitely calls into question the fight between artists and the industry as well thanks for joining us now is physicist joel tenenbaum sure writes the occupy wall street movement started off as a protest movement against corporate power as it evolved across the nation clashes between the protesters and police started to highlight a different issue altogether the schism between cops and the communities they serve to protect however amidst the struggle one man has stood out to bridge the gap between us and then retired philadelphia police captain ray lewis decided to make a bold statement he wore a police uniform all protesting with occupy wall street at zuccotti park along with

two hundred fifty other protesters lewis was arrested on nov seventeenth the day of action he became a national icon shattering the image of the police as the enemy but at the same time he encountered serious backlash even though he served twenty four loyal years in the force he was personally expelled and stripped of his union benefits now you do have to do a lot to be booted from the fraternal order of police but apparently expressing your first amendment rights while in uniform cross that line captain lewis may have lost his benefits some may say he gave a much needed credibility to a movement that was painted by the media as a bunch of so-called hippies and through it all he still post protested in uniform to this very day well ray lewis and self joins us from our new york studio to talk about his personal trials as well as the occupy movements tramp's thanks for joining us ray ray when you went out there with your uniform on did you have any idea the firestorm that they would be rained on you for doing this. abbie thanks

for having me first of all and yes i was prepared for that and i realized it was going to happen and i want to head with it anyway but let me make one correction i think you said i was expelled from my union and that they are that has not been decided yet but that decision will be made surely whether to expel me or not all right well thank you for that clarification i wanted to just mention you know you asked multiple rhetorical questions in your hold legal proceedings one is one is which you know why do you think they went through such great lengths to stifle your first amendment when they knew that there was no legal precedent to do so. be that's the most important question about my whole participation in this movement why did they go to such great lengths and it is my belief that they were pressured by corporate america because the one sign i carry on a daily basis is to ask people to watch the documentary inside job inside job is

a scathing indicting film of corporate bank specifically in the two thousand and eight financial collapse and anybody who watches that documentary will fully understand the corruption of our banks in this country re what corporate interests do you think facilitated the backfire against you for just practicing your first amendment. well in philadelphia the fraternal order of police a lot of cops want to be the president of the union and they have elections and these elections are run just like any other political election they are based on money a lot of advertising goes into these elections and those cops don't pay for that advertising out of their back pockets this advertising is paid for by corporations banks financial institutions subsequently when you're elected you are beholden to

those financial institutions and when i come out condemning these financial institutions if the president of the fop wants to get continuing contributions he better pay heed to the banks really were you surprised i know that you said you were expecting to encounter this on a small scale but i mean were you surprised that the very thing you were protesting about happened to you on a micro level where you saw this complete on accountability and you know any in your own force i mean the thing that you were out there protesting about happened to you in your own community yes i was taken aback a little by that especially when i got the envelope with a letter from the fraternal order of police while opening it i naively was thinking they're going to say brother lewis we support you one hundred percent is there anything we can do instead they threaten me with having a hearing perhaps to expel me so yes i was surprised that they took that extent

without even giving me the courtesy of a phone call and finding out exactly what i was doing what i was about and ray you talk about there's actually another gentleman in philadelphia who does impersonate a police officer i mean they kept threatening intimidating you with saying that you were in person in a police officer when you weren't i mean you served on the force you're the captain for twenty four years and they knew that there was no legal president to do so but at the same time there actually is someone who doesn't person at a police officer and garners a weapon at that. why do you think that there hasn't come down on this person for the same charge big because if you read the information about the person that person has contributed quite a bit of money and police motorcycles to the police department and that's how he got away with dressing in full police uniform riding a police motorcycle and illegally carrying a glock that he did not have a permit for and when the police commissioner of mortgage new jersey where this event took place was asked why didn't you arrest him for carrying this illegal

weapon the police commissioner's response was because i did not want to embarrass him wow and yet they have no problem only trying to embarrass intimidate and threaten you are simply practicing your first amendment right i wanted you to talk more about the chilling effect that this does i mean do you think that this is just a message being sent out to all police really and just saying look this is what can happen to you if you choose to go out and and protest against corporate interests or whoever is really appalling the strings and public. oh absolutely it's a chilling message and it's done on purpose this is not by accident they want to make sure no other officers join me in promoting this occupy movement the other thing is they when they come out saying what i'm doing is illegal or improper and give me an order to cease and desist wearing my uniform and they will or they will

take any and all necessary action to stop me what so egregious about this is this sends the message to officers that they can violate people's first amendment rights because after i got that letter from the philadelphia police commissioner ordering me to stop i went down and i protested in uniform outside of the city hall of philadelphia a reporter seeing me protesting in uniform having the threatening letter the police commissioner wrote me approached the police commissioner and through his spokesman he said after i called his bluff he said we have decided to take a hands off approach to the lewis controversy but this was after he had ordered me to stop and after he threatened me. months to finally admit that there is really nothing you can do and i wanted to touch really quickly upon how other police officers even serving jail sentences have still received their pensions and just it's just incredible what has happened to you as a result of this raid where do you see this going the whole occupy wall street

movement and you've really served as a symbol to bring you know the mainstream media trying to marginalize this movement and you've really served as a symbol to say hey this is this is everyone and the kohli's are ninety nine percent to we're all part of this fight against corporate greed if you could just talk a little bit about where you see the movement going and how you really served as the transitional role for that. i don't really look as to where the movement is going i have no expectations i don't want to spend my time doing that because it's not going to do any good wondering where is it going to go i rather spend my time in my positive energy or in determining what paths i can take what can i do to further the goals of the movement well thank you for your sacrifice and you knew that you would have to make one and you're definitely fighting an uphill battle and it is really important they are out there and thank you for standing strong on that

and we'll be following the case. that obvious like you're having me that was retired philadelphia police captain ray lewis. still ahead on our team once college students pass their finals and walk down the graduation aisle there's a long road ahead before they can put their college days behind them it's called student debt and things are about to get a lot worse if congress doesn't act fast that story next. decline of american power continues. things are so bad that might actually be time for a revolution. and it turns out that a popular drink of starbucks rather surprising him greedy and. very good. luck in the ilona so we'll get to the real headlines with none of them

or see the problem with the mainstream media today is that they're completely disconnected from the viewers and from what actually matters to those viewers and so that's why young 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. . it's the ball and chain that stays with you until the day you die cannot be expunged or forgiven it's the student debt bubble and it's a looming crisis hanging over the head of every american weeks ago mark the day that student debt hit the one trillion dollar mark and for the students who are the lowest and the lowest economic tear things just got substantially tougher starting july first federal pell grants are set to be cut for thousands of students here the students that will be affected by the cuts. sixty five thousand new college students without diplomas or g.d.s.

sixty three thousand students who have been in school or the new maximum of six years under the program three hundred thousand students will have their grants reduced or eliminated because of more stringent income requirements so what is going to happen when the student debt bubble bursts or can this crisis be averted for more on that i'm joined by sarah jaffe associate editor at alternate dot org sarah what do you think about the recent decision to cut these programs well it's class war abby i mean how else do you phrase it i mean i was out in a march last night with a bunch of student activists here and their new chant their new favorite chant is one two three four tuition fees or class for the pell grants go to the poorest students they go to the ones who don't qualify for merit aid in this case they're cutting them as you said to students who have been in school for over six years which is usually working people who are going back to school or who can't afford to go to school full time so they're taking it away for once again the hardest working

people who are trying desperately to live the quote unquote american dream that says if you go to college and get a degree you'll get a better job and you'll have a better future so why do you think these austerity measures are always targeted towards toward the lowest economic i mean down at the top the people who need it the most i mean i know you're saying it's class or it just seems like it's just over and over again these talks of eliminating the and it's always just focused right on the people who need it the most. those are the people who can afford lobbyists. i mean it's pretty simple right who you kick people when they're down they have a harder time fighting back what do you think about this interest rate debate the freezing of the interest rate do you think that this is do you think of this is really. going to change things if it's frozen off or is it really do that there's a bigger issue at hand and this is kind of a distraction from the bigger issue. well here's the thing if they do actually let tuition the interest rates double that will materially affect

a lot of students that's going to be thousands and thousands of students who will be paying twice as much interest on their student loans it's absolutely an issue that we should be concerned about the problem is right now that both parties in congress agree we should extend the tuition freeze the tuition interest rates for a year that's one year that's still not going to help the economy is not magically going to be one hundred percent better next year and meanwhile they're just fighting over how to pay for it when by the way the government makes money on these loans ok even at the three the lowest interest rate even though around three percent they are lending and they're making more money back than they are spending on these loans so having these stupid arguments about how to pay for it it's ridiculous. that you're wearing a red ribbon and i know that in solidarity with the canadian protests that are happening right now how does their struggle relate to the struggle about the student debt crisis could you talk

a little bit about bout it. so the red square is actually it comes from the phrase i'm sorry my french is going to do it but it's a reference to being squarely in the red or. so it's the same struggle there right the students in come back have been striking for yesterday was their hundredth day of striking over to action which is essentially is going to be more debt. there are students in australia protesting tuitions hikes there are students around this country protests intuition hikes the students here at cuny in new york and then protesting tuitions hikes and they have adopted the red square as part of their own movement it's a symbol of the debt that we all have i have student debt i have had the same student debt for the last ten years because i've essentially been able to only pay the interest on it for ten years since i've been out of school. it is a global movement just like the austerity is the same it's not exactly the same but the policies are targeting the same people and they are heading in essentially the

same ways around the world and the students and come back and the students here in new york have been in communication and people that i know here have been up to come back to work with the students up there to learn their student union model and other tactics so that they can figure out how to get how we get four hundred five hundred thousand people in the streets of new york in the streets of los angeles and st san francisco or just going to say you know it seems like in other countries there are massive protests of students fighting against this debt crisis in their countries and it just seems like why did you have to take the student out to hit one trillion and we're not really seeing that influx of you know thousands on the streets protesting this i mean to do but it's just kind of blew mean and that we're going to see that if nothing's done about this. i think the thing with debt is that it's delaying it's delaying your payments right when you are taking out a college student loan you don't think about having to pay it you just think i'm going to get through school i'm going to get a good job and i'll pay it off and that has sort of been true. although like i said

i graduated ten years ago and i'm still carrying the same ball and chain. but now that the job market is terrible that something like half of all recent college grads are either unemployed or underemployed you know. we're seeing the fallacy of that story which is that you can go to school and you will get a good job and it doesn't matter how much debt you took right i mean for the first time going up on us you know for the first time more and more of those unemployed or college graduates than not i mean so so what is the solution here other than of course alleviating the expunging you know offering for you to be able to declare bankruptcy on all these things i mean should people start looking at alternatives other than going to college. i am a big fan of education a master's degree i learned it i did i went to school as an undergrad i was an english major which was certainly not going to get me a great job but i did it and i loved it and i don't want to be the person who is

telling people not to go to school however i would say that if you are going to take out a massive amount of debt you should think about where you're going to school how much it's going to cost you why you need to take out that much debt and also we need to be organizing this needs to be a movement this is why i'm wearing this this is why a lot of people around the city and around the in this country are now wearing the square because we need to understand that this is a political problem it's not just a personal problem it can't be solved by you taking out a little bit less or a little bit more debt each year we need to freeze the tuition rates the interest rates we need to lower interest rates we need to write down the principal on these loans we need to fund public universities so that kids can actually go to school for free or very little money i mean we really need to entirely rethink the way we pay for higher education in this country it is a shame when people have to choose between going to college or you know thinking that it's not worth it anymore and it really is a sad state of affairs. and it's going to be

a really important crisis and struggle to follow thanks so much for your work sir john if you editor associate editor at alter net dot org does it for now for more on the stories we cover to go to youtube dot com slash our to america or check out our web site and also follow me on twitter. culture is that so much movement in which of course you write on it until it is nato but if critical roles that summit in chicago this military alliance decided many things in principle like ending the occupation of iraq. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada from giant corporations are on the day.