innit. bad to worse the civil unrest in syria is propelling the middle east into crisis mode and deepening the divide in terms of international response will bring you the latest information coming out of the region and question the accuracy of the news americans are getting about the middle east from iraq to syria. bradley manning is finally getting his day in court the twenty four year old private first class accused of leaking hundreds of classified military documents is in pretrial hearings this week does he stand a chance against the strong arm of the u.s. justice system. and states across the u.s. are declaring a state of emergency during the worst drought since the one nine hundred fifty s.

but that's not the only thing affecting your food supply these days we'll tell you how a new bill aimed at helping one company is in particular is changing the american food chain for the worse. it's wednesday july eighteenth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wahl and you're watching r t. well as a civil war group syria doesn't look like there is an end in sight this after top syrian officials are killed they include the defense minister the deputy defense minister the security it adviser and assad's brother in law now it's unclear whether a suicide bomber or a remote explosive device was used and the explosion and violence rages on in the region want to take a look at just how the conflict is being covered and how the media is shaping public perception of what's going on there especially after

a new poll that shows the public perception of conflicts abroad is just plain wrong take a look at this. sixty three percent of republicans polled still believe there were weapons of mass destruction in iraq that's a big difference from democrats and republicans a much smaller number believe and that miss truth to this day now when it comes to syria it's very difficult to know just what's happening there that's because the syrian government for the most part is not letting journalists in the country but top government leaders here insist that the u.s. is not intervening militarily but according to the new york times there is a lot the u.s. is doing behind the scenes the state department has authorized fifteen million dollars and non-lethal aid to opposition groups the u.s. is reviewing options for sending cia officers to the region to aid the opposition reportedly cia officers are operating now in southern turkey and also the u.s.

is considering providing satellite imagery and aerial surveillance and intelligence on syrian troops movements to the opposition so it's no secret that the opposition is being armed but who exactly is giving them away well it's unclear but if they turn to their neighbors iraq has a huge stockpile to donate that's thanks to the u.s. and the billions of dollars taxpayer spent to bring weapons in there and now that the u.s. is leaving they plan to leave behind a treasure trove of military equipment from the huffington post the giveaways include enormous elaborate military bases and vast amounts of military equipment that will be turned over to the iraqis mostly just to save the expense of bringing it home those bases didn't come cheap construction costs exceeded two point four billion dollars according to an analysis of pentagon annual reports by the congressional research service. so what do we really know about what's happening in

the country and is a diplomatic solution possible at this point joining me now r t correspondent marina pour in iowa marina hi so can you tell us more about the resolution the u.n. security council this resolution that is being backed by the west that's right there is a resolution that the security council is expected to vote on thursday morning that has been drafted by the u.k. and supported by the u.s. france germany and portugal this resolution. drafted under chapter seven of the u.n. charter what that essentially means is that it calls for sanctions against the syrian government if if the syrian government does not seize fire and withdraw from heavy populated areas within ten days in a result of this resolution says that under chapter seven if it supported that it

will extend the u.n. supervision mission in syria for forty five days that mission is set to expire on friday and that is the only amount of international observers that are in in syria right now to report back and verify to the security council to the u.n. to the international community what's happening there's three hundred on arm u.n. observers there right now they did suspend activities in mid june but it is very important for their presence to remain there and according to the u.k. and its supporters they will only allow for this mission to be extended if the security council agrees to potentially put sanctions against the syrian government now russia and china are at odds with this resolution from the west tell us about the resolution that they are considering and why they don't agree with the one being backed by the west. well simply put russia said it will not support any resolution under chapter seven for syria russia has stood firm saying that

sanctions against the syrian government will not will not help the situation the crisis in syria russia has also drafted its own resolution and submitted it to the security council for the un supervision mission in syria to be extended for another three months now the international monitor kofi annan on has asked for the security council to put joint pressure on the syrian government and the armed opposition group to keep them from continuing this violence to have them essentially cease fire but russia believes that the resolution the drug that's been drafted by western countries is only putting pressure on the syrian government is not balancing the circumstances at all now the latest news is that these high profile deaths that happened within the assad regime i mean what are the implications of that and does it mean we're any closer to an end to the crisis there. i don't think it means that there's any any way of being closer to an end of the crisis if

anything it's exacerbating the violence and the deaths that are taking place in syria we heard washington officials say that the situation in syria is spiraling out of control defense secretary of the u.s. leon panetta said that it's time for the community to increase its pressure on syrian president bashar al assad and asked him to step down and give put his power over to a transitional group but we have to remember that the free syrian army is also fighting with al-qaeda al qaeda has come forward in support of the opposition groups in syria and the u.s. knows this and you've seen video we've seen video of the members of the free syrian army in the streets waving flags there's also reports coming out of by the new york times in the past few weeks indicating that the cia is some members of the cia are based in turkey and are smuggling weapons into syria right now with this latest blast that has killed

a very high level members of the assad government i can't imagine that this will bring an end to the crisis anytime soon if anything it's exacerbating it and now as things appear to get worse there is a diplomatic solution even possible at this point. well i think that's what the international community is trying to hammer out now mr kofi annan is the one that asked for the security council to do lay its vote for another day so they could reach some type of consensus but the most important thing i think to underscore here is that the u.n. supervision mission in syria is quite critical if that if that mission if that mandate does not get extended the international community is not going to have any any groups any international monitors in there to verify what's taking place in syria that could even complicate complicate this exacerbating crisis to begin with and according to the u.k. and. and the europeans and the u.s. they will not extend that mandate unless it is under the auspices of chapter seven

of the un charter that allows for sanctions against the syrian government and potentially somewhere down the line possibly military intervention even though the western countries say that's not what they're going for but last year in the case of libya we saw that military intervention is possible and not something that russia and china and some other countries do not support. i do want to bring up one more thing marina the pentagon has announced that they are sending this aircraft carrier to the region it's called the you. see denis what message could this be sending where you're looking we're looking at that aircraft carrier right now this reportedly on its way over to the region what message could that be sending. well liz clearly that aircraft carrier is not carrying chocolates and flowers this is not sending a positive message to many that are seeing that aircraft carrier are making its way

to the middle east the u.s. already has two aircraft carriers in the region and now they're sending this one several months early their virtual plane was that one was supposed to leave in this one was supposed to come in now there's going to be a total of three u.s. officials would not make it clear as to why they're sending this aircraft carrier whether it was questions over iran's nuclear program whether it's about the syrian crisis the u.s. officials just say it's about u.s. security concerns but clearly when you send more military into a region that is dealing with a lot of uprising dealing with a civil war where one countries in the midst of a civil war that's not going to help ease the stresses the nerves the temperaments of everybody involved so the u.s. is clearly taking bold moves that may not help a serious situation thanks for keeping us updated we of course will be keeping a very close eye on the way things play out at the u.n. security council that was our correspondent marina pour in iowa. but pretrial

hearings underway in the case of army private bradley manning he is accused of leaking massive amounts of classified information to the whistleblower web site wiki leaks he's being charged with aiding the enemy his supporters held him for being a hero for exposing government secrets and revealing the truth behind us foreign policy jailed for over two years now and reportedly tortured supporters say he has already faced cruel and unusual punishment and sets a chilling example of what becomes of government whistleblowers are the correspondent abbie martin is in jessup maryland where the court hearing took place today and she joins us now live for the latest hi abbie so anything noteworthy come out of the hearing today. yes today you know this is day three of what will be a five day pretrial hearing for private bradley manning who's coming up on eight

hundred days of military jail now liz being held without charges what happened today mostly was an assessment of impact of the f.b.i. assessment of you know was this really a threat to national security a lot of definition of terms flying around what is classified what isn't classified as we know bradley is being charged under the espionage act for transmitting classified information the problem is that the espionage act only pretty only is designed about classified information and then we already know that the collateral murder video was not classified and you know with the defense actually withholding hundreds of thousands of documents it is a little hard right now to actually deem was this really a threat to national security if so how exactly did that happen another thing that they're doing today is actually still left in the jury pool and doing some previous questions for the jury pool they're asking them you know you'd be hard pressed to find someone especially not specially in the military who hasn't heard of this case

it's a pretty popular case everyone's heard of you know bradley manning we so there's a lot of speculation that there could be pre-determined bias within the jury selections that you have the judge asking you know also gender identity issues issues about don't ask don't tell and we know that bradley manning is gay. and also just about activism what they think about whistleblowers so there's a lot of a lot of things going on today but you know as this trial is kind of dragged on there are a lot of secret meetings between the defense the prosecution and the judge have lagged on for some time coming distills been doing a live blog today from the hearing but so far things have been dragging on pretty slowly here all right you had mentioned earlier these documents that are being withheld i think you meant to say the prosecution is. withholding those documents and you know as you mentioned things seem to be dragging these pretrial hearings hearing seem to be dragging and he's been imprisoned for over two years now can

this be seen as another delay and manning getting a fair trial. yeah i think a lot of people will lose and i think that's why you have glenn greenwald. signing on to open up this court hearing right now they have kept everything pretty locked down and they're not releasing any of the court documents the journalists were reporting on how to take everything noted by hand not even on a laptop so it is very secretive there's no transcripts of even the court proceedings going on release to the public so this is all going to be very locked down and yet it is going to delay a lot of the proceedings and people are just saying open this up i mean it's already been he's already been held for eight hundred days without without charges and this kind of going along with the whole julian assange you know is this june nineteenth there's been an ecuadorian embassy. once again afraid of extradition to

the united states where he could face similar charges i mean these are very serious charges that we're talking about here aiding the enemy and when the prosecution is withholding you know so many documents that would outline how exactly you did a the enemy it is very difficult to tell at this point a lot of speculation flying around with both sides now you had mentioned before the difficulty in selecting a jury for this because of these predispositions these pre-determined predisposition so i mean at this point is a fair trial even possible. i mean some would say that it is someone to say that it is and i mean it depends on what side you're talking to here liz dispenses saying it isn't fair when you're withholding so much of the evidence that would determine the outcome of what the charges are and then you have the prosecutions saying it's not up to us to say you

know that he. released classified documents that's already a given but at the same time as i said before the espionage act he is in charge of the espionage act for releasing classified documents but the main thing that he that really is noteworthy here is that collateral murder video which wasn't classified so you know a lot of people are just saying how long is this going to drag on for how long are you guys going to keep things secret from us when there's you know these deals going on or not duels but i mean secret meetings with the prosecution defense and the judge that are kind of lagging and all these kind of redefining the terms and also you know when you have a military tribunal and everyone is involved that's in the military they could have preconceived biases and i think that's really what people are worried about at this point is what people think about the case people have the biases against what what he did or did not do also you have president obama coming out and saying you know he's guilty he broke the law michael mullen coming out and saying he has blood on

his hands i mean these are high level officials already making pre-determined cases against private bradley manning so when you have these people kind of already shaping the narrative and you know exerting their outside influence on the case it is going to court going to influence the people involved and i think that's what people are really worried about here right abbie thanks so much for keeping us updated over there that was our t.v. correspondent abbi maher and. well it's no secret that this summer has been a scorcher across the u.s. one temperature record after another has been broken and states are searching for ways to beat the heat and the weather is actually causing a state of emergency and many places across the u.s. take a look at this right now the american agriculture industry is suffering from the worst drought since the nineteen fifties it's ruining crops now speculators are saying this could drive food prices through the roof but while the media outlets and food experts focus on the side effects of this drought there is

a bigger threat to our food supply a so-called food blitz that's happening right now right under our noses it looks like the controversial agricultural giant monsanto could be above the law the monsanto writer as it's called was snuck into the twenty thirteen agricultural record cultural appropriations bill and what it does is require the secretary of agriculture to grant temporary permits to corporations that want to cultivate genetically engineered crops now this is alarming to critics that say it makes months on to immune from federal law and give them a free pass to spread their g.m.o. seeds now the bill likely is up for a vote in congress any day now so what are the implications if it passes to discuss this i'm joined now by ronnie cummins executive director for the organic consumers association welcome ronnie's so with all this controversy surrounding months and

there's shady history how in the world can lawmakers even consider giving them giving them this privilege. well if you look at monsanto and the other biotech industries contributions to members of congress especially members of the house and senate that are cultural committees you can see that these are very powerful forces out there in congress these days seems to listen more to their big donors than they do to the public but if they were listening to the public they would hear that the public wants genetically engineered foods labeled and we want them properly safety tested before they're pushed out into the environment and pushed onto our plates in our kids in zone school cafeterias now ronnie there is at least one lawmaker speaking out against this monsanto rider as it's called his name is representative

peter de fazio and there is an amendment to kill this part of the bell can you tell us more about his proposal. yes well the proposal would basically reduce the already inadequate. control that the federal courts have over the release of genetically engineered crops in the united states all right now when the e.p.a. and u.s.d.a. and f.d.a. don't do their job properly public interest groups have to take to the courts and sometimes we can get the courts to pay attention to the evidence and to basically injunctions to stop the planting of these crops until they've been properly safety tested well this rider to the twenty thirteen. hager cultural appropriations bill would eliminate the possibility of using the federal courts to slow down these hazardous genetically engineered crops so this is not only

a threat to public health and the environment and biodiversity of course it's a threat to the constitution we supposedly live in a society where the balance of power between the legislature and the executive branch and the courts and this would basically say that the courts no longer have any say once the government decides to get into bed with the corporations they can do whatever they want and you had mentioned earlier they have a huge amount of lobbying power that these agricultural corporations have and congress i mean with that in mind that being the case is that likely about there's going to be enough backing you know to representative peter de fazio as amendment. well the probably the best thing we have going for us is not only that hundreds of thousands of people are contacting their elected representatives and telling them don't pass this monsanto rider don't destroy the balance of power guaranteed to us

in the constitution but the second thing is that the corrupt politicians and worship center fighting among themselves they can't seem to agree on the on the farm bill or the house appropriations and they're afraid to fight among themselves in the public eye right with the elections coming up so this might get delayed a bit further even after the august recess. if that happens hopefully you know the american public will rise up more strongly and get it across to these people that don't pull such a blatant pro monsanto tech pro business antic right before the elections or we might throw you out there i mean let's talk about the implications if this bail were to pass as specified this provision of the monsanto rider i mean

what would it mean for our local food supply. well it would mean that we have little or no power over the kind of crops that they plant out there they've already planted one hundred seventy million acres of genetically engineered crops around the united states approximately one third of all the cultivated farmland and yet there are dozens and scores of articles peer review articles building up to point out that when you feed these genetically engineered foods to animals you do serious damage to their to their system i mean there are studies out there that ninety percent of pregnant women have this genetically engineered b t in their bloodstream and in the placenta of their of their babies that are going to be born there's an outbreak of allergies and and diet related diseases that appear to be

connected to our ingestion since one thousand nine hundred four have an increasing amount of genetically engineered foods this is why millions of americans have turned to organic foods because since the government want to label genetically engineered foods the only way you can be sure you're not eating them is to purchase a certified or gannet sued so which millions of people are doing and that all sounds absolutely horrific ronnie i know your share of paris has millions against monsanto and i know that part of those that are fiercely among those that are fiercely opposed to monsanto are farmers i mean f. this bill were to pass how would that affect farmers here in the last. well most farmers in the united states are not growing genetically engineered crops they're either farming organically or they're using seeds which have not been genetically engineer now the problem one of the problems with genetically engineered crops is

that once you put them out into the open environment their d.n.a. their mutant d.n.a. spreads to non genetically engineered crops so if you're a corn farmer selling organic corn. and your neighbor decides that they want to grow genetically engineered corn the. pollen from that genetically engineered corn is going to spread and contaminate your your variety so the majority of us say farmers. you know well let's look at this technology but in the meantime there's this thing called genetic pollution and i don't want any of this and it's happening and it's happening right now so this monsanto writer will simply make it easier for monsanto has clients out there to pollute your fields and ruin your business and you know

pollute the genes train because once. these genetic mutations are out in the open environment they reproduce themselves they can destroy the genetic characteristics of previously existing varieties that have been out there for thousands of years all right around it thanks so much for coming on the show and weighing in on this very important topic affects all of us and what we put into our bodies that was ronnie kamens the executive director of the organic consumers association. that's going to do it for this hour but the capital account is next on our t.v.'s let's check in with lauren lister to see what's on today's agenda laura and what are you working on over there either liz well ben bernanke the chairman of the federal reserve was on the hill today and anytime he is there is plenty of fodder for discussion analysis of course a fair share of criticism and today will be no different they're saying that

a scenario in which the g.a.o. would really truly audit the fed and that congress would have more ability to audit the fed's business was a nightmare scenario according to bernie he and to one point he's got it right because while the fed's interests are problematic it would be problematic i can see if congress had more ability to impact fed's interest so what is the answer and then we will talk to the person that so many people want to hear way and on the fed and that is lou rod rockwell of the ludwig von niece's institute on all things fed and ben bernanke he as well as p.s.g. has some revelations of come out from the c.e.o. suicide notes before he attempted to kill himself we'll talk about what those indicate to lauren thanks for that update that's all coming up next on the capital account but that's going to do it now for the news from one of the stories we covered you can check out our you tube channel at youtube dot com slash our team america you can also check out our web site that's our team dot com slash you can also follow me on twitter liz wall we'll be right back here and

a half hour. culture is that so much a given to each musician a person finds the mark webber in syria coming witnessing a new generation of warfare and information for their peers no doubt western media aims to construct a concise. mission and free cretaceous free zones for charges free coming from inside the free is free. to type free. the old free broadcast quality video for your media projects and free media oh don the r t dot com. cool.

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