today on our t.v. fighting for his fifteen minutes at the republican national convention ron paul and his supporters haven't given up hope yet why he could have a prime speaking role at the r. and c. later this summer. and twenty years after the panamanian leader manwell noriega was sentenced to prison in the u.s. for drug trafficking the narcotics war in latin america still rages on in the u.s. his grip on the region is tightening but we want to know what's in it for them some answers ahead. plus it's a hard knock life for american students they're becoming prisoners to their education in more ways than one from cops in the classrooms and metal detectors at

every door it's school safety on hyperdrive so when we shift from protecting america's youth to imprisoning them. it's tuesday july tenth five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wahl and you're watching. well despite what you hear he's still in the running republican presidential candidate ron paul and his supporters aren't giving up on his delegate strategy and it looks like that effort is paying off in the state of nebraska one week from today there will be holding its convention now paul nabs the state it will be the fifth state who's delegation paul controls and according to republican national committee rules securing five states means you can formally be nominated for president and that guarantees him time to speak on the

floor so it's not over yet but can he pull it off and what would a win and a breast a mean for paul in his very loyal following to weigh in brian doherty senior editor at reason dot com joins us now he's all the also the author of the book you see there ron paul revolution the man and the movement he inspired brian welcome so it's not a done deal yet is it. it is not you know wrongful campaign has been declared dead many a time since january and it's never been true and it's never been less true than right now because as you said news on the cost of a really incredible achievement for him short of actually winning are rich enough that made it. an opportunity for wrong paul's ideas to be presented for a national audience under the banner of the official republican party is going to be a great move and it's going to be the first step in the real next wave of the ron paul revolution which is not to be about ron paul per say but it's going to be about all

of its fans who are taking over republican parties on the local and state level and they're going to continue doing now if he's the cares of rask it would be the fifth state i do want to take a moment out to look at the states with caucuses that ron paul has already won there as we iowa made in minnesota and then we see an under his belt and now he just needs nebraska and if he wins the brass god that will land him that fifteen minutes at the republican national convention on the floor there so ultimately that would give him the platform at the convention what exactly would that mean for the ron paul revolution as you call it it would mean that a genuine voice for peach the genuine voice for bringing the truth a genuine voice for really cutting the size of government where mitt romney last trillion dollars wrongful proposes a budget that gets that balance within three years without raising taxes he is the true conservative voice that the establishment is try to shut out but if he can get

that fifteen minute speaking slot that's probably going to be the largest national audience he never got and then the ron paul revolution has proven anything it's that when people get a chance to hear him you know mediated you know not with someone else telling them what they think his message is remarkably effective and it's going to be a watershed in the shape of the republican party. it's going to be a much more wrong polling or you. know now paul has said before you know that you know it's not just about winning it's not about becoming president but it really is about this message so if he is able to make it to the convention on the floor and spread that message isn't that a victory. absolutely yeah a lot of those fans of course are about this because they really expect that when ron paul has been in the game long enough that. i'm not going to say he didn't want to win i think he understood that it wasn't likely he would win but unlike every other candidate in the race ron paul can win without getting the nomination but

that his mission as a public figure has always been about educating the people and situational libertarian principles in his running for president and stand on enormous success along the ground in getting that he can for the convention is going to be. he is an educator for liberty and that is going to be a great opportunity to do that educating probably the biggest audience. that i have some reports there brian that ron paul over there nebraska they're gearing up for this kind of ron paul and surge and c.n.n. preparation for this they're really bringing in a lot of security kind of a anticipating that along with the ron paul insurgency is going to be a lot of chaos what do you make about this increased security that they're already planning the republican establishment on both the state and national level is made very nervous by ron paul people in various state conventions including oklahoma arizona louisiana have sort of fallen into chaotic conflicts between those two

forces paul people claim and i think it's usually the case that it's because the party establishment is trying to not follow with their own rules in order to shut out and keep out the wrong all forces. is sort of saying hey we're afraid of these ron paul where we're hiring security for the first time ever i don't think that's necessary these poll people are not a rebel army anymore they are naturalizing themselves within the republican party and they want to become the republican party and they're succeeding in doing it so i don't expect you know this fight even though it was actually back in the past but it is true that there is there is a conflict of interest between the. those that want to hear the name wrong all over again and be mainly young who are trying to say we need to restore the republican party because. the only going out there saying all right and you know. perhaps insecurity is

a bit warranted because in the past we have seen this clash but tween mitt romney supporters you know the establishment and ron paul supporters they have clashed in the past and things turning quite chaotic here is what ron paul had to say about it in a recent interview on c.n.n. you know i want people to act dignified and not try to cause a ruckus and break down you know and disrupt things but the same time i tell them you don't have to get pushed around if they're not following the rules you have a right to stand up to the rules and i think for the most part these winner in these winning. caucuses that we've been involved in we have pulled the rules and the other side has at times not. so what do you think about that you know ron paul here is saying you know what if they're not following the rules it's totally your right to fight back. i think we're all in all the reporting i've done on the

various state conventions if you will i saw you i'm pretty convinced that it's been the case that every time things have gotten rowdy you're raucous it is because the wrongful people is standing up for proper procedure in cases where the party establishment is trying to illegally or against their rules or shut them out not permit them to vote for the room the chairman and the like i think ron paul is the republican party establishment follows the rules then there is not going to be any forward trouble from wrongful people and i think it's great that even while calling for the koran he did let his people know that you know it's ok with him if they stand up for their rights because some of the messaging from the campaign i think that's the grassroots with feeling that we want them to just calm down and be respectful. old things. but also stand up for your rights and all the rules that ron paul he has actively campaigning has stopped spending money and states in which you know that hasn't already held their primary our caucus as he has said

he's kind of given up on actively campaigning and he is now focusing on this delegate strategy and even without pumping money into his campaign we are still seeing his followers kind of trucking on and trying to make this delegate strategy happen what do you think about that despite not spending any money on campaigning that there is still you still see this very passionate following and. you know this focus on making this delegate strategy work. what it proves is that the wrongful revolution as i called it my book idol is a much more than long haul and it's going to live long after ron paul is no longer active on the political scene the fans have learned the ideas of constitutional liberty and people call it a cult it's not a cult at all they are wrong all because we're in for and what not and you know ron paul could probably have said i'm dropping out of the race and harley and probably

wouldn't have stopped his supporters because they understand that you need traction within a major political party the republican party is the one that means or eventually the most open to these ideas because they're supposed to stand for limited government and the ron paul people are taking it over and this story is going to go on a long. long balls presence on the scene as you know of ron paul he had to absolutely have made a very clear distinction from himself and mitt romney the establishments and when asked if he would endorse mitt romney here's what he had to say your son senator rand paul has endorsed romney i take it you're not yet ready yourself to endorse romney or you. know you're not ready no way. so he had no way out even going there just a very firm straightforward no way would he ever and doris romney but you know if ron paul does make his way to the convention and we are seeing that he is kind of

changing the dialogue at least to some degree within the republican establishment could he possibly affect who would be the v.p. pick as. i don't know but are you i think we're on the cost right now of the wrong. thing if they yield with the long haul but i don't think they recognize it deal with them that much this is just the beginning oh paul i've been in the majority you know i'd be very surprised if it. actually included would be used and i think despite rand paul and whatever ron paul and things are doing the most for fans are probably not going to be able to see fit to vote for mitt romney they are going to continue to work with the republicans wanted to shape it in a more libertarian direction but mitt romney and i don't know their support without changing you know the way to sell them so significant way and we are at

a time but thank you appreciate you coming on the show that was brian doherty senior editor for reason dot com and author of ron paul revolution the man and the movement he inspired. well today marks the twentieth anniversary of the x. panama dictator manuel noriega was sentenced for drug trafficking in miami on the peril of the cia and graduate of the school of america as noriega has become notorious for representing representing one of the most serious foreign policy failures for the united states and as the us is a war on drugs drags into its fourth decade it looks like a little has actually been achieved and the crackdown violence rages on in latin america that a man for drugs still remains and while brutal drug cartels stay in power u.s. prisons are filling up with nonviolent drug offenders so what will it take for the u.s. to change its failed foreign policy and latin america and rethink the war on drugs to discuss this nico he's the field organizer for the school of americas watch he

joined us earlier today take a lesson. the men will know diego was trained at the u.s. army school of the americas which is a military training institution for latin american officials and soldiers it was actually set up in one hundred forty six in panama later was moved in one thousand nine hundred eighty two to four benning georgia manuel noriega was trained at the school americas in one nine hundred fifty s. and sixty's and he was even considered one of the student honors he called our man in panama manuel noriega was on the cia payroll that he said from one thousand nine hundred sixty six until his ouster by the us invasion in one thousand nine hundred nine and little has changed since then the us army school the americas has consistently graduated the worst human rights violators and eleven at least eleven dictators in latin america and what we as the school americas watch are saying is what is the purpose behind the training of these human rights violators who keep

popping up from argentina. general be there was just sentenced for for kidnapping babies you know in colombia every drug traffickers a lot of the major generals were just recently cited as being in the payroll of the north to a drug cartel. in mexico we're seeing the same thing as well the u.s. continues to prop up these human rights violators and the continues and as you just had mentioned this school graduates a lot of these people that end up being dictators and human rights violators of what is it about the school of america does that pumps out these these graduates the end up committing these crimes later on well in one thousand nine hundred eighty six the pentagon was forced to reveal that the school the americas was actually teaching torture and after the grassroots pressure continued to show that

graduates were still being trained and in two thousand and one they changed the name of the school to the western him. institute for security cooperation however we understand that many of these graduates continue to go back they are the people who are doing the defending of of corporations work in latin america at the work behest of the united states there's a colonel in east who is an a graduate from honduras who after the coup in that country in two thousand and nine which ousted the democratically elected government of manuel zelaya told the miami herald that because of their training in the united states it would be impossible for them to work with less leftist governments so this is a clear indication of the training that they're receiving the culture of militarization that is being in in giving imparted to these these didn't and here knowledge that culture is still exists today that's right yes it still exists right now the colombian government is investigating some of the top generals including the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff who is equal to martin dempsey general martin

dempsey in this country for receiving payments of up to one hundred thousand dollars a month from the. captured headed north baiji drug cartel in mexico right now and see that white is the police chief leon these i'll bet is is a graduate school the americas and has been seriously implicated in human rights abuses and there are indications in two thousand and three the brownsville herald in texas reported that the mexican six secretary of defense revealed that the original members at least one third of the original members of the set those drug cartel would receive u.s. training were mexican special forces who later turned over to the drug cartels so it's quite possible that this school is training the dictators of tomorrow is exactly right and the pentagon refuses to release the names of the graduates since two thousand and four so we continue to press the government to release those names of instructors and graduates and to continue to take our protests to school it

seems shocking to me that there wouldn't be some i mean in the wake of. nine eleven out. dictators that did attend this school that there aren't more safeguards to prevent this from happening whatever that may be unfortunately that's right the school the americas once they change their name to the western hemisphere institute for security cooperation established a rubberstamp board oversight board which does little to actually track the graduates and most of the information that we have received is from our social movements allies in latin america and many of those social movements who have tracked the graduates in their countries have now asked their presidents to pull out of the school americas ecuador recently just pulled out of the school americas just two weeks ago becoming the fifth country in latin america due to do so so now what does that mean exactly does that mean people from appledore can no longer attend that's right and as of june twenty ninth of this year the president said no more police or military will be attending the school in america is now looking this

is kind of an opportunity to talk about the bigger picture of what exactly is going on in latin america you know this war on drugs that we've been fighting it for for decades now but are there any real science that it's working well the point where you see us intervention in latin america is that it's been the same objective with different facades in the one nine hundred fifty s. and sixty's up to the ninety's it was the war on communism then it became the war on terrorism and the war on narco terrorism we're seeing the same people are being affected the same people are dying and the same people are getting wealthy so while we're talking about drug cartels in latin america the same people are running money through the u.s. banks the same people are getting wealthy off of this drug war and not much is changing as you talked about also in this country more and more people are being sent for nonviolent drug offenses so it's a issue that the united states refuses to address but more and more latin american

leaders are actually trying to take a step back and say listen this drug war is not working. obviously the. croce isn't working i mean at what point what will it take for the u.s. to change its policy there i mean it's been for decades now before they change their policy there and change the approach to the war on drugs i think it's going to take a very strong grassroots movement both in latin and latin america and in this country to actually stand up and say listen these policies are not working we cannot keep spending billions of dollars each year on training militaries we need to actually look at the causes of drug addiction look at the causes of poverty and that's when we'll start seeing some changes right now the united states refuses to look at that and continues to pump money into a cycle of contracting military contracts and money for war you know another argument that's made is that you know the reason why this war on drugs isn't going anywhere is because the demand has been consistent and as long as that

there is a demand there is going to be a supply so i mean it seems that the the reality what kind of how can we change the policy to affect or to reflect that reality well i think right now there are a lot of people working on the issue of decriminalization of drugs in this country right now many of the presidents in latin america have made that stand saying that we must decriminalize is this war and decriminalize the drugs so you know the really what we need to do in this country is continue to close ask for the closure of military training institutions like the school the americas continue to ask the pentagon stop spending billions of dollars on the wars and that's where i think we will succeed but it doesn't look like president obama is receptive to decriminalization at this point he's under a lot of pressure he's under a lot of pressure and we have to understand that power concedes nothing without

a demand so we must continue to keep pressing president obama or any whoever enters the white house. we understand that even democrat a republican the actual what has happened in latin america hasn't changed much despite the democrat or rebel republican administrations over the years so the wars continue under different names and lastly i just want to ask you i know that you are your organization is really advocating for the closure of the school of america is how far are you in that fight and do you think it's realistic that that can actually be achieved any time soon well it's been a long fight it's been over twenty years since the first protest at the school of the americas started we continue to do we continue to fight we understand that this is going to be you know we're going to keep pressing congress to pass legislation and science from latin america are very heartening the people the governments are pulling out of the school americas so we're five down and we're going to keep going until we close down that school so it looks like other countries are recognizing

that something needs to change that's right that's right right nico thank you so much for coming on the show and weighing in that was nico. he is the field organizer for the school america watch well some schools in the u.s. looking more like juvenile detention centers there's a growing trend of police officers patrolling school halls and with that more kids getting arrested the biggest offense disrupting class reports came out recently that it's twelve year old girl was arrested for spraying perfume on herself at a middle school in austin texas swearing smoking cigarettes violating dress code all these things can land kids a ticket to court and according to the guardian in two thousand and ten police gave about three hundred thousand classy misdemeanor take gets to children as young as six years old so are these schools criminalizing normal childhood behavior i pose these questions to susan philips research analyst for the sentencing project take

a listen i think that's true and i think it's part of a larger trend that we've seen in this country over the. thirty years to solve problems using the criminal justice system so we see children in classrooms now with police monitoring their behavior and rather than treating misconduct as part of a normal. childhood behavior we have police stepping in and arresting children or finding them as young as six years old so these children are getting exposed to the criminal justice system earlier and earlier. and they're so they could stigmatized by peers. and lack of facilities they may learn even worse behaviors from other children and we find that this group of children are more likely to drop out of school which is one of the respecters for people becoming involved in adult crime and so we use the expression cradle to prison pipeline to describe this

and it is we set up at an earlier an earlier age to be part of this what we call the prison industrial complex part of this cradle to prison pipeline is this is zero tolerance policy that is instated in a lot of public schools and i wanted to to bring that up here exactly what this this policy is schools rely on suspension expulsion citation summonses an arrest to handle disciplinary problems like bringing cellphones and i pods to schools smoking cigarettes and skipping class students who might easily be disciplined there with a visit to the principal's office end up in jail cells this is the essence of the pipeline and criminal charges are brought against youth in schools for violations that never would be considered criminal if committed by adults so i mean as you had mentioned before these things i mean that they're relatively i mean pretty minor a lot of them are nonviolence and then they end up in these these this prison

system this juvenile prison system and then i mean how does that affect the rest of their life i mean in terms of going to college get. giada kind of creates this this vicious cycle. and it picks it helps would think of themselves as criminal and bad it may be totally ineffective in addressing whatever the underlying problems are with the child or the top family or in the top communities that have led to disrupt behaviors. and it and so we see these children being more likely to drop out of school not finish school not get jobs to begin hanging out more and more with other children that feel separated from the main stream and as part of the process of criminalizing children of feeding them into the system and i did it not too long ago i interviewed a young a young man who who he spent time with a juvenile detention juvenile justice is done and because of that as

a minor he ended up in the adult prison system i want to play a clip where he describes his experience there was it was an event and so rehabilitate you would use an awful punishment you know having barwise around the gate and use for pay for criminal cyber lifestyle. and i want to talk more about that i mean when you're put into this situation how that prepares you for a more criminal type of lifestyle where it's not rehabilitated but in fact harmful but that's true and for the first problem. it's possibly a missed opportunity to intervene as the young man said it's not rehabilitative many of the programs that we see aren't effective they might address problems or try to address problems the child haven't but they don't also try to address the problems that the families having or the problems that the community is having and we know that on top of that the fact that children and adults. becoming involved in

the criminal justice system helps to perpetuate problems we know from the adult system particularly communities where there's high levels of incarceration that feeds the very problems that are associated with crime in a sending it feeds disruptions in families it feeds the poverty it feeds single parent households and and so we have this reverse situation where by using the criminal justice system to address problems we're also creating the situation that could continue to create a need for the criminal justice system unless we step back and say what else is it that we can do and fortunately we're beginning to see some states looking at the huge amount of money that's being spent their state budget on corrections saying maybe we could take some of that money and put it back into communities and families and children and and not spend it on high cost detention beds and prison read and actually get some better outcomes and you know it seems like it specially

in the state of texas it seems like there is that focus to expand law enforcement and this expansion is expanding into schools and into middle schools and to high schools how did that happen i mean where did the mentality shipped from education to to discipline i was it were only texas. but it's a number of states is los angeles is probably the leader in it. i think you have to go back about forty years the beginning of the war on drugs and this idea that we could take what is arguably a public health problem and deal with it through the corrections system and. we've continued to do that a number of ways and so putting police officers into schools as what might have been a preemptive move. as just expanded the use of the criminal justice system to solve problems that they can't solve it in some cases make worse. and that was susan

phillips research analyst for the sentencing project well that's going to do it for the news this hour but the alona show is coming up in just a half an hour let's check in with alona to see what's on today's agenda lauren what he alone to. what do you what do you what you are going on over there know. we are going to be talking about a lot of wall street corruption today from the fact of the new york fed may have known about the library scandal then there's the thing that everyone is calling maybe the next global and there's a lovely survey out there that shows that a lot of executives from the u.k. and the u.s. think that a little unethical or illegal behavior is necessary for success right that's coming up and more and just half an hour thanks for that update alona but that's going to do it now for the news from on the stories we covered you can check out our you tube page it's you tube dot com slash our team america you can also check out our website it's r t dot com slash usa and you can also follow me.