long. today on r t is stopping the end and its tracks a group of lawyers activists and authors are suing president obama over the national defense authorization act and now they've got a u.s. district judge on their side so is this the end to the controversial legislation last one of the plaintiffs next. more chaos in syria it seems the violence there is unstoppable while the u.n. is tiptoeing around the issue no one making a firm decision on what to do and the u.s. is strong arming its way into the discussion we'll tell you why the u.s. insists on trumping u.n. decisions. plus the people of taiwan have serious beef with the u.s.

more specifically our meat standards and it's driving a rift between the two nations we'll tell you what the dangerous ingredient is what it means for your dinner plate. it's thursday june seventh four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wahl and you're watching r.t. . well another victory today for critics of the controversial indefinite detention law a federal judge has ruled that the government cannot use that law to hold people in military prisons indefinitely the really comes after a group of journalists and activists sued the government over the provision they say it's unconstitutional and fear that they could be indefinitely detained under the law because their jobs sometimes require them to interact with terrorists while the government interpreted an injunction put in place by the judge a couple weeks ago to apply only to

a handful of plaintiffs in the suit but now the judge says no this is to be applied broadly to americans. to discuss what this all means for your rights one of the plaintiffs joins me now one of one of the plaintiffs in the case a tangerine volin is the founder and director of revolution truth and she joins you know from oregon welcome to andrea and so i want to get your reaction to the judge's ruling. and i'm grateful for that reaction and i very much. ok and it is andrea an interesting argument of the that the government tried to make they request that this injunction only apply to you and your fellow plaintiffs but the judge just made it clear that this ruling is to be applied broadly and we have a little quote from that ruling it states quote the supreme court has made it clear that when a plaintiff claims that a law is facially vague and violate violates his or her constitutional rights to

due process that party seeks to vindicate not only his or her own right but those of others who may also be adversely impacted by the statue in question. so standard what do you think about that the judge is saying you know this isn't just going to apply to you and your plaintiffs but this is going to be applied across the board in the u.s. . well obviously that's what we were aiming for we're not just fighting for our own first and fifth amendment rights we feel that we represent thousands if not tens of thousands of people across the country who are also similarly concerned so that really clarifying or make sense to me of course we didn't come forward just for ourselves i'll go we demonstrate harm in her opinion these plaintiffs are going to agree to what do you think about the government trying to shape it that way that this is going to only apply to that few people. it seems to me and i'm just

guessing but you are trying to maintain the operates you have a very ground into this statute and that's precisely the issue here we are questioning got incredibly raw the potential interpretation and the judge is saying no that's not how we're going to look at so far so. you're right so let's talk about what this bill is all about as stirred a lot of controversy the greater implications of the n.d.a. and why americans should be concerned about the cars of a controversial excuse me provisions and this law. well i can only speak from my perspective and i'm not going to turn to you but what i can say is that this approach presenters and as his lawyer. as someone as an activist working on civil liberties and someone who has. defended wiki leaks and bradley manning i have very serious concerns about the language in that particular statute so the implications

going forward if the united states government wins this case. i don't know what could happen but what i'm afraid could happen is that people who are advocating for civil liberties like myself could end up getting swept under the m.d.m. and indefinitely detained with no access to counsel which is very un-american that's not the american way it's not what we do things here and i want to protect our constitution so hopefully we win the case and that will happen. speaking of an american is the word you just used critics say that this law is also unconstitutional what rights do you say it puts in jeopardy. first amendment definitely our freedom of expression and speech and due process i in my i get i'm not attorney but to me this statute rolls the united states back eight hundred years to three magna carta days we've had due process for quite a long time to put forth a statute that says we can accuse you provide no evidence and then indefinitely

detain you with no access to counsel i just it's unfathomable i can't i can't imagine what the congress and executive are thinking i want to bring attention now to something that happened just yesterday this happened in colorado police reportedly responded to a bank robbery by arresting dozens of people and reports suggest that the cops trapped as many as forty cars and handcuffed at least nineteen people most of them are all of them presumably in a said they were held at gunpoint as they searched for a suspect let's take a look at some of the coverage of this. police spin in this group of cars drivers are ordered to get their hands up and they got behind shields at the end for a shot guns out there we know taser guns others and we don't know what the heck was going on we didn't know if we in the line of fire one by one drivers are pulled out at gunpoint and handcuffed they're told not their cars are served. so some of those detained say they were held without charges for hours so is this an example of what

can happen under the n.d.a. . you know i don't know that might be a bit of a stretch because it's a bank robbery situation i don't know the details but certainly yes in the future if the government wins this case and i'll kinds of things can happen i mean they don't have to put forth evidence for calling you an associated force of a terrorist and i just think that's incredibly dangerous which is why we brought the suit for four sorry i'm not sure about the situation. well you know as a journalist do you feel better do you have more peace of mind knowing that this order has been put in place. yes i am really grateful for and joined a conference where i was very firm stance on this and her clarifying or yesterday what i've just made over there is that the government attorneys are still doing two things one offering no evidence no witnesses no documentation. seemed to be

insisting on maintaining our rights offer no evidence and to their motion for reconsideration they issued a few weeks ago asking her to reverse her ruling they described independent activities independent journalist activities independent advocacy but they don't define independent what is independent independent i've talked directly with wiki leaks staff and it is that considered independent or not i mean it's such a gray area and it looks like the government is really trying to do its best to maintain this great area and there are already over how they wish to interpret that gray area and that's of great concern to me and others who have seen this war on terror become more and more surreal over the last decade and the definition of terrorism seems to be expanding as well we can see that some court cases that we've seen so we want to just kind of stand up and say wait a minute let's examine this this isn't this isn't going this is scary so i just favor the government's response i'm i'm surprised now it's

a little arrogant at least this is a victory another victory for you and critics of the n.b.a. and your and your fellow of plaintiffs alternately what would you like to see happen in court oh yes so definitely a permanent injunction on section ten twenty one b. that's what we're aiming for and that's what we'd like to see that would be a win for all of us for us it isn't that people around the world who are innocent people exercising their rights so that's what we'd like to see tender and thank you so much for coming on the show that was tangerine bolen founder and director of revolution truth thanks once. meanwhile syria has erupted into violence once again on armed u.n. monitors came under fire today as they attempted to reach the the site of the latest mass killings. syrian activists said government forces killed over eighty people today many of

whom were women and children this comes just one day after one hundred people were reportedly killed in other villages and while all of this has been going on the united nations has been slow to respond to the increasing violence with many many of its members divided over what to do about syria this has caused the u.s. to consider taking matters into its own hands and to go beyond u.n. sanctions on the country but this won't be the first time the u.s. has gone beyond international law to make a decision that impacts the world or it's a corresponding report and i it gives us a look back at the instances in which the u.s. has undermined the un's authority. the united nations is the only diplomatic forum where every country is supposed to be governed by the same rules united nations founding charter close upon us to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security a founding member and biggest financial contributor america ratified inside the

u.n. treaty in one thousand nine hundred five which prohibits unprovoked attacks or military interventions in sovereign countries unless authorized by the un security council but. my fellow americans today our armed forces joined our nato allies in air strikes against serbian forces responsible for the brutality in kosovo in recent decades the us has been seen violating the very international laws it helped create we have acted with resolve the u.s. and its allies also acted without authorization from the un security council when it launched a seventy eight day aerial attack on yugoslavia in one thousand nine hundred nine nato starts a war against the federal republic of yugoslavia serbia and montenegro. serbia for seventy eight days occupies kosovo and this doesn't have you an authorization until the very end the us again disregarded international law in two thousand and three after the security council refused to support

a military strike on iraq they withdrew their new additional resolution rather than face defeat clearing it is their argument the way for a military campaign without any new u.n. approval the united nations security council has not lived up to its responsibilities. so we will rise to ours is not in conformity with the u.n. charter from our point of view and the charter point of view it was indeed by circumventing international law for geo political interests experts say the us has systematically damage the confidence and credibility of the un it's been used by the united states i think as a fig leaf to get multilateral approval from the policies that the u.s. wants to do but if the u.n. doesn't agree with the united states as you know the case of iraq or kosovo the united states just disregard in the case of syria were kofi annan peace plan showed slow progress washington is prepared to once again bypass the u.n.

if the security council fails to impose more pressure on damascus and members of this council and members of the international community are left with the option only of having to consider whether they're prepared to take actions outside of the annan plan and the authority of this council. for diplomacy they have the legions apparently the united states thinks it has no need for diplomacy it has missiles and drones the u.n. was founded at the end of the second world war as a place for countries to solve conflicts through dialogue rather than gunfire however the honorable goal of maintaining global peace and security becomes harder to attain every time a member state decides to play by its own rules for ny r.t. new york. all toxic be americans eat it but taiwan is saying over my dead body while we eat that town is activists fighting to make sure that american beef stays

out of the country currently there is a ban on beef products being imported from the us to taiwan the ban applies to meet pump with topo mean an additive used to make animals leaner but this drug is banned in about one hundred countries that say it's not safe for human consumption. the taiwan government is considering lifting the ban which is stirring a lot of controversy and protests but this isn't the first time u.s. beef sparked anger abroad take a look at these images this is back in two thousand and eight tens of thousands of people in south korea took to the streets and mass protests against the government's decision to let us beef into the country and this was after the mad cow disease outbreak and after that they simply wanted nothing to do with u.s. beef so many countries find this be too gross to swallow but the u.s. is one of the handful that eats it right up why to discuss this george damager founder of survive and thrive t.v. joins us now welcome george so other countries refuse to eat it but many americans

don't seem to mind why the disconnect there i think americans are just uninformed and that's the problem or our meteor national media focus so much what's happening locally that we really don't even understand or have the opinions of be international community not that we should follow everything that other countries say to you but hundreds of countries are saying that this particular you know the beef product is tainted with the tiriel is that just by humans it's a little err on the side of you know safety and let's show this try to produce beef in this country that's healthy in more leaning towards organic and you know the controversial chemical is called it's called direct topa me and this is the this is the chemical that is banned from several countries including china china the e.u. yet many americans haven't even heard of this chemical why not. i think it's just

the the lack of it's really you know the fault of the media and you know bravo to you guys for covering these types of issues i know there's this movement to kind of eat organic foods natural foods help your foods whole foods and but still most americans are kind of behind the ball they're still consuming the products products with a lot of additives a lot of different chemicals and substances g.m.o. foods and it's just this we have to be more progressive in america about eating what's natural for our bodies and getting healthier and it's definitely not chemicals and products and additives it's getting back to what is natural and what exists in nature and how we can eat that food i think that's going to be i think the unicef great health benefits for the american people they just start eating healthier in whole and you have mentioned media coverage or the lack of it as to why americans seem to be ignorant of some of the harmful chemicals in hormones and

other things that are in our products and food corporations often pump a lot of money into advertising so do you think it's become taboo to target and expose these companies. well yeah i mean big media big agriculture probably beef corporations they probably have a big say in what goes on that we're television and if you're critical of them they could use that as an attack on them and i would say from a consumer's point of view you know we're not trying to attack big business we're not trying to attack the american beef industry we're saying guys you know you need to take in to consider you need to take into consideration the health of your consumers are in consumers you know age everything shouldn't be skewed one way we're hey let's pump up these hormones and chemical and let's do the same thing with with agricultural products because sure we've got we have great the ability to

produce a lot of food in america but so use of stone you have fifty percent less and nutrients you know forty or fifty years ago so we may be producing more food but if you look at the common american cancer hypertension diabetes i mean is exploding health issues but yet we spend more money on health care and almost every other country it makes you question what's wrong here could it be that the food ingesting is what's making us so sick. i do want to mention lawmakers do insist that this this chemical of a man. is not harmful and the it in the amounts that they are found and b. and they're saying that critics are causing a big fuss over nothing and in the ad are hurting the u.s. economy what do you think about that argument well i mean if you look at it from a natural foods perspective i mean i'm eating beef today and i love it and i think we've i think we've evolved to eat beef products meat products but if you look at

it from a whole perspective this chemical didn't exist you know one hundred years ago two hundred years ago one hundred thousand years. why are we getting back to how we over time how we evolved that's what we need to get back to use find out what did human beings consume with the products and it sure as heck didn't have all these chemicals in it and i don't trust scientists i don't just the research community why not just start out from a basic premise that we need to get regular natural food products the american consumer and yards this kind of goes along with this this fight in america for people to know what's in their food in california they're fighting for a g.m.o. foods to be labeled and once again several other countries i mean this is normal this is required that the foods are labeled if they are. but why is there such a fight to get labels on our food here in the u.s.

. well americans are a little slow on the uptick i mean we're severely obese we watch a lot of t.v. we're stuck in the nine to five growing and we're not exercising and we're a little dumbed down that can be from a lot of different reasons it's the television the propaganda could be the actual foods that we're ingesting right now are kind of causing this kind of lol in wanting to get healthy and think about what you eat but the who we have to blame is really ourselves and off i believe we're going to have to turn it around and one of the ways we're going to turn around is stop the government subsidies of all those tough i mean we're subsidizing the health care of people that have not taking care of themselves we're subsidizing the agricultural companies that are producing food that's not healthful for us in any thing part of our society government needs to get the heck out of subsidizing unhealthy behavior that could be part of the reason

why we have all these problems in america is because you have big government getting involved in areas that they shouldn't be and i think left on their own people will probably start making the right decisions well we see the backlash and taiwan today too bad they don't want this kind of foot in their country and south korea a couple years ago people taking taking to the streets because you know how their health than their what they put into their bodies is so important to them what will it take for americans to care to that degree. what will it take that's the as an angel question and that's a very difficult question i don't know i got both your there are twenty nine died of cancer and they're sneaking pizza and coke into him while he's getting chemo i mean it's like hello wake up. i don't know i think there's going to be ten twenty maybe thirty percent of us that focus on our health get healthy and it's about dissemination of knowledge dissemination of what's actually in your food but you

know i'm sad to say probably fifty to sixty percent of americans aren't just going to hear they ingest whatever's in front of them you know whatever they see on the t.v. whatever they feel like eating and they're just going to be healthy and they're going to die early hypertension fact. diabetes cancer or whatever and i all i can do is take care of myself and promote living and surviving thriving being healthy but i think you know there's people out there that you just can't help but sure as hell don't take my money to support it you know someone's going to be you know smoking cigarettes their entire life or eating bad food their entire life and then they're then they want to come to me to pay for their medical costs i'm sorry it's not available and it's the same thing with. anything dealing with health concerns of people who just don't care well that all sounds terribly depressing guard hopefully people will wake up and care more about their health that was george hamon founder survive and thrive in t.v.

. well occupy activists around the nation have continued their efforts months after their encampments were broken while conservatives have tried to demonize the movement other groups seem to be benefiting from occupies message artie's or mongol and has the effect occupy is having on this year's political landscape and why efforts to co-opt the movement may backfire. occupy wall street estimates are that visible public. their message of wealth inequality continues to ring in the extreme politics i'm saying you're bringing in a million bucks or more a year. then what the rule says you should pay the same percentage of your income in taxes as middle class families do president obama and other democratic leaders have pushed to a freeze taxes on the rich while the curious by the message that some activists

believe all titians told in way to slang which does not match their true efforts. have we seen a millionaire tax you know we haven't seen a millionaire tax cut we've seen the bailing out of main street now we've seen the bailing out of wall street over and over and over again since its beginnings conservatives have tried to link occupy to the president picture i think the whole occupy wall street movement was orchestrated to provide president obama with a major campaign fame well liked by groups have rallied in solidarity with other liberal out of the kids the movement has questioned the entire electoral system and man actually lead to a lower good turnout for the democrats a lot of people would have voted on the lesser of two evils. where democrats were completely fair i was system now and i will never vote for obama again as far as i'm concerned president obama has sold us out occupy has also

encourages unions and community groups to become more militant in their acts of civil disobedience that unions in los angeles commonly protests against the one percent oh concept which was made popular by occupy wall street the power of the unions has also helped them mobilize thousands of people to take to the streets this is the message that both parties the best to one party or the other party to mr mubarak take which. unions have bolstered street demonstrations but concern in occupy remains that labor groups are too deeply entrenched in mainstream politics to ask that's co-optation you cannot both be part of occupy and supporting president obama or mitt romney romney large marches on banks make news but members of occupy still feel more radical action is needed a certain thing to change the way things work but now is a movement that doesn't at the end of the day it doesn't can seem power it doesn't

ask for permission to be in the streets as occupy progress is there is still debate over how you. who said the ninety nine percent movement should be if we're going to sit there in chorus of the ninety nine percent doesn't make sense to exclude about sixty million obama voters. in this nation is like move on dot org or using our language that means we're winning that's good as the fear of the movement and its message being taken over or diluted persist they're designed to be co-opted and they have a role in the role they've chosen for themselves which i respect is to push the issues to do their own experimentation with direct democracy to play store to gauge issue based rights activists believe their message will we know just like the huge corporate power structures they feel already their way. in los angeles problem valley in the arctic. the capital account is up next on

our tail let's check in with laura lister to see what's on today's agenda lauren i live today ben bernanke it was on the hill the central banker in chief giving an economic report to members of congress so of course what everybody wants to know investors politician and savers is if there is going to be more stimulus or what many would call q e three now ben bernanke he did not say ok he's not up to him they meet all of the federal reserve board members later this month however he did say that they have plenty of tools in their arsenal that they could use and this is something that a lot of people are expecting so live in the situation that he has reach into his toolbox to screw around with the economy and your financial freedom we're going to talk about what people can do about it right lauren thank you for that update that's coming up next with or unless they're on the capital account but that's going to do it for the news for more of the stories we covered you can go to

youtube dot com slash r t america check out our website at r t dot com slash usa will be right back here and a half hour. more

news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. operation to rule the day.