tonight on r t occupy gets raided activists in seattle are given a rude awakening after swat a swat team raided their home in the middle of the night is this an intimidation tactic or par for the course in dealing with the occupy movement we'll get to the bottom of it with the man who was there when it all went down. plus we go to college get a degree get a job for the past few decades this formula has been drilled into the heads of americans view as a recipe to success but with mounting debt and no grace period for graduates r t s is higher education widening the gap of income inequality. and the shortfall from comedy to political incorrectness funny man daniel tosh is in hot water this week for a joke he made about raping women but where exactly did this line fall between inappropriate

and free speech last comedian doug stanhope. it is wednesday july eleventh eight pm in washington d.c. i'm christine for south you're watching r t well yesterday morning organizers from the occupy wall street movement in seattle staying an apartment had a rude awakening they were raided by a swat team according to the warrant issued the police said they were looking for quote anarchist material and continuing an ongoing investigation of the made a riot but the police left the apartment in seattle with out arresting anyone and just a few pieces of seized property and that is after they busted down the door used a flash bang grenade and tore through the entire apartment to find out more about what happened i was joined by political organizer philip neal take a look. basically i woke up to the sound of the blasting going on. actually open we

had just enough time to jump out of a little bit of clothing on and put our hands behind our heads and then the swat team came in with their automatic guns drawn had been pointed at our backs for a good period of time while they searched the house clearly disconcertingly to wake up in the morning. anyways they raided the entire house they went through everything they hold everything out of my drawers etc etc i asked them to show me a warrant was refused by the first a swat team member he said the detectives would be out later in the show me the warrant i asked if a broken the door they had knocked no response asked what precinct they were from he get no response later the detectives came up they flashed the warrant really quickly we didn't get to see the war until it was actually all over and we had the zip ties taken off our hands and everything anyways. i mean that's the basic gist

of it with many people all get a look at them or how many people were in the apartment at the time and how many of you guys were occupy activists who pretty much all known community organizers and occupy activists people that i work with are regularly people i'm known for their radical politics as well as people who are organizing young coming everything correctly one festival we give away free food in the central district here in seattle at risk sunday for everyone and so we're all known organizers to other people at the time were actual residents of the apartment two or visitors ok just about four or five of you and what time did this all happen or this was it six am six am anything if i think five and they didn't even knock at the door there wasn't even an attempt to if for you know what they are not sure they were probably using or at. yeah more and more and no one not we're

not sure anyways they used a flash bang grenade in the stairwell nobody knows the stairwell could have been a living room and then they broke down the door immediately really disturbed the neighbors as well philip let's talk about this i mean it's no secret police and occupy activists don't always get along but this is new territory actually going into someone's home we've seen the footage from new york from oakland but this is on a you know oftentimes public property police out there let's say let's think about this in a little bit bigger picture here i mean what do you think this says that they're now doing this. first of all it says i mean this is challenged in glasgow air terminal if you were to enter this materials thing from the warrant but also you know so that means this is explicitly political they're targeting people who are political ideology a political ideology that the police think that they have but i also want to know this is new territory for the occupy movement it isn't territory but this isn't really new territory this is been going on for

a long time this is tom in cracked this in communities of color and the only thing that's new about it is that we're mostly many of us are are white activists it's not something that's usually been done to white radicals or white people since the last red scare in the fifty's but it's very common practice in communities of color it's the beginning of a. kind of new jim crow era that people like michelle alexander talk about so in one sense it is new but in another sense it isn't and i also want to emphasize that you know where young activists we live the majority of our adult lives like after nine eleven after he treat acts that are etc more or less you know the state so in a way it's a lot less surprising for us than i think it is for all the people were he said this and we see this all the time we've grown up and it's still somewhat shocking though at least to me that they would do this and from what i understand i mean you guys were zip tied your hands were tied while the raid was going on but nobody was

arrested and one kind of items did they take out of your apartment. and no one was arrested they took basically they took a black hoodie that belonged to my girlfriend they took a few gloves a pink scarf. they took a notebook that belonged to my girlfriend that was reading to us she was one of the she's five i don't concede at all there are some that it was a notebook with her and snow you know they took a few flyers or like a book release party it was a book on this in the occupy movement so i think they took the center of this on and it took a few flyers that have been handed out at occupy recurrence previously basically i mean it was like nothing it was things that would have been in anybody's house yeah just so interesting you said you know you asked the police and the swat team what they had done to the door i mean are they going to have this fixed and where did

you leave things with them in terms of you know this whole incident. well i mean things were left on terms of on the same terms they started with which was and a brutal force and just. plain disrespect on the part of the seattle police department but we've become used to that the commanding officer here was wesley freeze and that's f.-r. i yes yes and he was pulled over in two thousand for her drunken driving him threatening to kill the officers that you got twenty days suspension and now he's heading up there a day investigation squad i mean this is really with s.p.d. they're one of the most notorious of police departments in the country they're currently under armor justice investigation for acute excessive use of force these teams for just regular everyday activity they've been critical critiqued by former police chief norm stamper even who i you know i don't agree with on most things eclipse heats them for using swat teams in situations like this i mean they were

overall you know we were completely cooperated and they were still you know threatening people saying that they're going to go to jail et cetera et cetera and no arrests were made philip as part of i would say nationwide but it's actually becomes a sort of an international movement the occupy wall street movement to talk a little bit about. this incident and how it you know it should make people concerned on a much more broad level as this movement moved forward. sure. you know i don't think occupies just become national movement though i think it started as international. and it came over here you know we have indignados in spain all of these things been bouncing back and floor and heating off of each other we really. we've been suffering the same police repression in country after country in greece in spain and so these are basically you know they're there at

a fundamental level united in the united by the underlying structural economic factors more than any it's not just greedy corporations etc etc is that really is built into the system and that's what people are responding to and the reason that we're being rated the reason that we're being attacked in a specific way i'm part of a red spark organization here it's our collective were openly communist we have open radical politics in a new attractive way you know and reasonable being attacked is because you're willing to say these minor reforms and purchase sions and things are not and no one philip had to be clear had you know when your friends and i broke into law. well the thing is though always try to put charges on people right now no we have people here who have done a rescue militarist asked charges of the i don't know from alzheimer's and they've

been found not guilty we had someone who had assault charges and church and charges put on him and he was found not guilty they continually are trying to charge people with things whenever they get arrested right now no one's being charged with anything what we've done is exercise our first amendment rights and we've had our fourth amendment rights breached of course but it's for speaking out you know that's what i was wondering if this was just about your or if it was actual you know charges or or convictions appreciate having you on the show something interesting stuff political organizer philip neill joining us from seattle thanks so much well it has been sixteen months now since the violence in syria again so we want to take a closer look at the efforts at peace talks and what they have or have not brought about our day correspondent salon will saffir spoke to the prominent syrian opposition activist michel kilo and here's part of that interview. well the immediate and come of the talks was predetermined by the fact that you have on the one hand a delegation from a country where food borne war is raging and

a great power on the other you can hardly expect a specific outcome at the essentially we wanted russia to get as aid because we represent the oppressed people of syria we want to serve the people of syria we protect our interests and we presented our position but i think we were frank and convincing we told russian officials will be needed to hear from various opposition groups in syria for the syrian crisis to be resolved russian assume a well balanced out of russia plays a major role but it should not be part of the problem russia has a long history of friendship with the syrian people the people of syria expect russia to help them gain freedom and overcome the current deadlock the syrians want to russia to take a fear approach to be as fair as possible precious and not side with the forces that will surely lose in the struggle that is the current regime and foreign minister lavrov said russia was not committed to the current regime in syria that had alternative solutions leveled made a few remarks about the lack of harmony among opposition groups and mentioned arms deliveries another military issues we responded very openly and frankly to all

these concerns our delegation said that the opposition has decided to present a common front of the keitel conference and all opposition groups in syria have signed the papers are a transition period and on the future of syria as regards the arms deliveries we have pointed out that the procrastination of the city a crisis makes it difficult to resolve the problems of arms the sooner that is a fair solution to the crisis that would meet the demands of the city in people the sooner it will be possible to cut the supply routes for arms deliveries by standing in the way of resolving this crisis those who are concerned about the arms made in the interest of those using those arms russia looks at the situation from the viewpoint of the ruling regime whereas like it old lover of it should look at the ruling regime through the prism of the current problems these problems are bigger than the regime bigger than the opposition and even bigger than syria these are international regional plan are to be. problems they cannot be resolved and this conflict between the regime and the opposition is resolved the crisis cannot be

resolved unless there is international consensus on the way it should be resolved in the way that would take severe to democracy through a transition period as five powers including russia have agreed in geneva this is why russia's role is very important russia can help resolve the city of conflict democratically this will lead syria out of the current deadlock and put an end to violence bloodshed and destruction in syria what is happening today benefits israel and possibly the us if this destruction goes on the ruling regime wins it will rule over ruin and the suffer a strategic defeat if the opposition wins it will inherit the country in an unmanageable condition in any case it is necessary to stop this violence stop this bloodshed all the efforts taken at the international pan out of levels in order to put an end to the violence only make the ruling regime all the more harsh events and see them eventually pan out in such a way that russia will lose as will the people of syria that was like michelle kilo head of the syrian democratic foreign delegation. well last week lawmakers in

congress took a very important vote to prevent the doubling of student loan interest rates for one year but in doing so they had to make cuts elsewhere and now quite a few people are predicting that less money in state budgets along with rising tuition will mean even fewer low income students will now have access to higher education i talked about this more in depth with kyle mccarthy director of community outreach for default the student loan documentary. well we're seeing students just not being able to afford to go to college anymore which is unfortunate because you know so many people been told for so long that that is the key to success so we're also see lots of people that are just defaulting on their student loans which sets them in an even worse position so that reached they've graduated in gotten their degree but are now having your credit destroyed from default to student loans and as many as one out of five or defaulting understood lunch which is really is really bad you know it's so interesting because back in

you know our parents' generation they would come out of college with nothing now we're coming out of college these days with negative which is different than nothing and now you're saying when you default on your dad you know your credits being destroyed break down for me a little bit kyle sort of the system here and you know how this is creating an even larger gap in income inequality which sure and you said it our parents didn't have the situation they were burdened with this huge debt and just since nine hundred seventy eight tuitions has gone up almost nine hundred percent or exceeding inflation so our parents really didn't have to deal with the situation and were coming out of a school with twenty five thousand dollars average just out of undergrad and were in the worst job market there we've seen in so long so now states are expected to pay back immediately not really have the grace period that that's just so unfair

and very scary but talk a little bit about this bill passed i think just before the july fourth holiday by congress literally with moments to spare break down some positives and negatives here on who this effects. sure i mean it will save some people some money but what's happening is we're going to say you're going to pay immediately and the reason that grace period in which you know if was such a horrible job market that is impossible for so many people to start paying back which route puts them in a position where we're going to see even more defaults and people just be thrown in a horrible situation where they're going to just suffer from a life or just lifelong student debt and just never be able to ski now i know there's a petition going around it's calling for student loan forgiveness i know this was one of the big topics that the occupy wall street protests but the bottom line is you know let's be realistic here this is a time when our federal budgets are state budgets are really

a mess and they rely on some of this money to be paid back the money that they loaned so why is this you know one of the most prominent solutions being proposed you know complete forgiveness. well it's actually not complete forgiveness that we were talking about h.r. forty one seventy the student loan forgiveness act two thousand and twelve so one of the things that actually calls for is for students to pay back ten percent of their income for ten years the ten ten program which you know would actually put people on a better footing when they come out of school and it includes private and federal loans which the i.v. our program does not so with this would actually put them on a payment program which is reasonable and by is not by any means of just total forgiveness act but what it does is it allows people that don't have this disposable income our entire generation right now to actually spend money if you will the economy if it would if anything it would be a great thing for the economy because so many people generation y. generation x. just don't have the money it's all going to student loans so this would actually be

ten percent which would be far less then. than what most people are paying right now and after ten years it would be gone i think it's important you brought something up to private loans and public loan so certainly there's a very low interest rate i think it can be argued for government issuance for these public loans but a lot of students still can't pay especially for some really amazing topknot scores you know you get a little bit of money from the government with low interest rates but then you have to subsidize this with you know loans from citibank or in these big corporations and banks that they can charge a much higher interest rate talk a little bit about how that has impacted students. like you said there are federal and private student loans in the federal if you have some more consumer protections on them the private student loans are not really regulated. the interest rates are sky high a lot of times and we're seeing people defaulting on these when the same banks or

same companies will own the collection companies as well so what will happen is they'll make far more money if some defaults because they can cut their. the back end as well and. which is unfortunate but the eye of your program you can't roll your eyes you are or your private student loans into the interest based repayment program but with a jerk forty one seventy that would be the case it which is why million people have signed this and we've really been telling people to go to listen to the million dot com which is. basically getting the word out about this bill and telling congress to bring this to a vote and listen to your constituents i think it's important to talk about for profit colleges we're talking you know university of phoenix kaplan there's a new study out that shows that students who attend these for profit colleges earn significantly less than students who attend you know comparable schools i mean what do you make of what's going on here especially with this nonprofit thing i mean it

was really marketed as a way to help people who are already have jobs or children but it seems to me in a lot of cases it really preys on people who don't understand what's happening oh without a doubt and that's so unfortunate you're going after the people who are suffering the worst and throwing student debt on top of them and a lot of these these for profit schools are owned by banks and so what is the motive there motive is to make money and they don't care if if you can pay for your situation is it worth their money. by really going to some of these areas and telling people you know you can get whatever degree you want you'll make so much money you're coming out so we're seeing with a lot of these schools and the just saddled with debt coming out with a worthless degree or a degree that's going to actually earn them far less than other degrees and that is so unfortunate i want to talk really quick about your project that you guys have been working on default the student loan documentary what was the most surprising

thing that you found that you think american people need to be aware of. would just the fact that a lot of people are having their lives wrecked that there needs to be a solution you know we're told we need to go to school we need to do all this do it make your lives better. we're seeing education be treated as a commodity you know it needs to be thought of as a right. you shouldn't have to suffer because you would just try to better yourself and try to be your country too so if we're seeing people that just suffer for a medical issues you have to take time off school they still have to pay their student loans you can't get out of the can't get jobs start to pay them and that's just making their situation far worse yeah certainly the question of health care the question of education all of these same things seem to be a little bit interwoven here and it really does lead as we said to this larger and

larger gap in income inequality we want to thank you for being on the show call mccarthy director of community outreach for the documentary default the student loan documentary. so there's been a bit of fallout from a recent comedy show at a los angeles comedy club and the blog of a girl in the audience this all happened when daniel tosh of tosh point made the remark that all jokes about rape are funny now the girl in the audience blogged so i yelled out actually rape jokes are never funny i did it because even though being disruptive is against my nature i felt that sitting there and saying nothing or leaving quietly would have been against my values as a person and as a woman i don't sit there while someone tells me how i should feel about something as profound and damaging as rape after i called out to him toss pause for a moment then he says wouldn't it be funny if that girl got raped by like five guys right now like right now what if a bunch of guys just returned so we want to talk about free speech political correctness and if there should be lines drawn or exceptions made especially when it comes to comedians so to discuss this with me earlier i was joined by comedian

doug stan hope and i first asked him for his reaction to the tosh drama. it's silly and overblown and embarrassing to our silly country first of all we don't know what the story is we know it was a blog account from some meathead who walked into a comedy club and then wrote about it it's not like a michael richards situation where there's video we have her word against the club owner its word and tosh has said anything and regardless even if what she wrote is accurate it's nothing rape jokes are funny is what he said they are to some people . and you know i guess if you haven't heard of tosh what he says can be a little shocking but i do want to play some clips of comedians including tosh just to sort of lay out the way comedy is in the modern day. it's one tone and that's why you guys are good air traffic controllers because there would be no difference

between a baggage left behind in new york and a wing on fire in terms of the tone i'm saying that right now i mean by that is our viewers don't like you i'm not condoning rape obviously you should never rape anyone. unless you have a reason like you want only they will let you. have an orgasm in their body if you know right away what i think this turns off the charts i play practical jokes are constantly though i got her so good a few weeks ago i replaced her pepper spray with silly string. anyway that she got raped. all right so clearly some people actually do find this funny. do comedians have a responsibility here i have three and three for three on those whole areas to me. if you don't find them funny first of all maybe you should put more effort into researching what entertainment you're going to see you just warm blindly into

a comedy club and think it's all going to be laughlin nevada buddy hackett then it's your fall you should know what you're going to see it's it's not like it's hard to find out who the people are that are playing that night now maybe if easily offended you shouldn't be in a comedy club to begin with a lot of you know you don't really hear too many people saying you know should be fired or anything like that but there were a whole lot of people saying he should apologize to any sort of that on twitter but do you think should comedians have to apologize he never apologized it makes me sick and i hope she was being sarcastic when he apologized because in his apology he did say aside from the misquoting out of context. i sincerely apologize i hope that was somehow an underhanded slap at her being a liar but either way if you don't like it read there's a lot of things just because rape might be touchy to you hey you know what diabetes

might be something i dealt with in my family that should we not do diabetes jokes where do you draw the line everything should be funny and i'm laughing and you're not i win and that's what i was going to ask i mean is there anything that you think should be off limits or too sacred are there any lines that should be drawn at all. if you have you have the choice where i can laugh at this or be morose about it no there's no lines more dramatic the funnier and that's what i was going to be sort of touched upon this before. cause a reputation and the majority of the audience was probably prepared it was very interesting this blogger wrote that dane cook didn't really offend her at all but obviously tosh and i mean at the end of the day and you think this responsibility does fall on both sides of the stage well first of all cars has a reputation for being really funny and really dark so if you're listening to her

account of what he said you're probably not getting the funny version it's just like lenny bruce is famous case where he had a cock test of using his material but using the common delivery when you hear from a comp it's not funny let's talk about politically political correctness and this country certainly for some people it just goes a little too far and i think you would agree with me and i mean when i say that what do you think are some of the biggest reasons why this is just important to talk about because people are bored and they don't want to deal with their own problems so they create problems but they don't want to confront their boss or their own husband or their horrible whatever their life is they'd rather you have by curious nonsense on twitter to yell about including me and this conversation i know they are i want to ask you about this meeting that you're attending the amazing meeting is coming up and want to guess what's this all about. it's skeptics

meeting i guess they've done it since two thousand and three i just got invited to go as a bunch of atheist skeptics and probably bitter and miserable people who like to make great jokes and the like what. in your experience doug i mean you're obviously a pretty well known comedian have you ever experienced anything like this i mean have you ever been asked to apologize for anything that you've said it seems every time i go to the u.k. i get involved in some kind of nonsense and it's usually language based and someone was offended by something because they have that problem you can't. use the word retarded. retarded as a description you know. if your body doesn't understand or shut that dog up when you get that in the door of art clearly your dog agrees with you i was going to say if your boss doesn't like the word retard. or the delete challenge because he is

he's asking you to apologize as well don't wait it doesn't just last question i mean what is your hope in terms of comedian in comedy rather in the modern day in this country what should be its function. to make people forget about their problems but as long as there's this many people who have problems with comedy i should do very well sounds good and. i'd be out of business great to have you on the show comedian doug stanhope joining us from arizona well the big picture with tom hartman is coming up at the top of the hour but for us here tonight that's going to do it for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america and for the latest information on the stories we covered today and a few that we didn't have time to get to check out our web site r t dot com slash usa also to find out what i'm doing i'm not bringing you today's top stories you can follow me on twitter and you can find me at christine.