there's a few steps away from the r. and c. convention in tampa hundreds of occupy protesters have set up camp they call it romney's bill and we'll take you inside. and we value work we're a society which celebrates hard work and we look to a government to make it easier for jobs to be created and people to go to work mitt romney talking jobs and the economy earlier this month in ohio thing is the people standing around him were reportedly forced to take an unpaid day from work to be there does anyone else find see the irony in this. the that's a good one of it is consistently fourteen fifteen percent and there it is right it's twenty plus percent for the american males that that's a crisis president obama is working hard to appeal to minority voters however many

argue he's overlooking the african-american community but mitt romney is not doing much better so will obama win over this demographic by default. it's wednesday august twenty ninth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t. it is day three at the republican national convention day two of actual convention activities in speeches and to say things haven't exactly gone according to plan would be an understatement hurricane isaac of course the main distraction from the r. and c. being the top story and the news cycles but yesterday brought us chaos and protests on the floor of the convention not by and really protesters but by the delegates themselves mitt romney is now the official republican nominee for president but yesterday's boos both from ron paul supporters and from those opposing the new

rules put in place by the republican national committee illustrate that full support behind their candidate is not easy to come by our the white house correspondent christine joins us from tampa for more hi christine. hey there listen that's a true fed's been known by the r n c for quite a while now but i don't think they really expected what happened yesterday just about this time on the floor here behind me i don't think they expected it to happen to the extent that it did we're talking about angry delegates from iowa from nevada from maine and the loudest of them being from texas many of them in support of ron paul many of them really in opposition to these new rules that were adopted by the republican national committee people say this is going to set a dangerous precedent for politics in the future but with as we know politics is not just about big red white and blue parties and convention it's also about actual policies that affect actual people so we traveled just a few blocks outside of the convention and found some people who are protesting

what they see is a dangerous future and they're trying to put a stop to it. i organized governor of a month tara colognes says she's sick of hearing that anyone who wants to can pull themselves up by their bootstraps i work six days a week and only get paid thirty fifty an hour because i'm a waitress and because of that i've been in and out of homelessness homeless people poor people are not lazy the mother of five including eleven month old anthony is part of the poor people's economic human rights campaign hoping to shine a light on issues faced by those living in poverty as the republican national convention takes place a few blocks away from the area they're calling romney ville a reference to the depression era hoovervilles our government is passing policies that are killing poor people. policies that are allowing children in this country. and allowing policies that allow elderly and disabled children to freeze to death

in the wintertime but on these hot summer days those staying here say the amount of power concentrated in their city right now is far removed from the life they have ever known what's a really sad and disturbing contrast. we have one percent of the population controlling more than forty percent of the well i can't find work. i been looking for albert there are nearly two hundred people staying here some of them have been here since may others are here just for the week of the convention other messages are very similar to what we've heard from the occupy movement but they're more narrowly focused on the high foreclosure rate and the problem of homelessness in america we have a convention here that talks about family values but they have no sense that keeping your family in a home keeping children fed is a much more important than family for you and whether they're gay or straight. a few of these romney bill residents will leave at the end of the week and had to

charlotte where obama ville is already being set up. for now in this pocket of the city most here say their protest is also their reality in tampa florida christine for sound. we thought this was an important issue to focus on as well because as you know if you've been watching so much of the cable networks the focus is on topics like abortion topics like you know the future of welfare but this is a real problem in this country what's been happening with foreclosures and being in florida that is extremely prominent here the foreclosure rate here i think the second highest in the country only after california so we thought this was an important issue to talk about with these people who clearly are against not just mitt romney but against the political system as a whole so we have these people there trying to get there is their voices heard in any way they can over at occupy tampa and romney well how do they plan to get their

voices heard as this convention sees its final days. well it's really difficult lives because we don't see one unified major protest against mitt romney or against the r. and b. what we see are various protests taking place outside of the convention center the other night there was a march of people against the new voter id laws as you know list florida is the state with wind if you elderly people and many of them have never needed to use a driver's license or an identification card to vote and that's going to change this year and it's happening in states across the country so that was one of the protests that we saw happen excuse the music here they've been doing rehearsals all day but so far as i mean i think it's just a matter of continuing to down on the corner and yell their messages and really trying to get those who are here in town for the convention to lift them ok so it's clear that from yours from your report there that there are huge romney fans outside of the convention but what about the people inside. well that's

been really interesting and of course we focused on it a little bit yesterday with those ron paul delegates. but you know there's a bunch of people who are you know a long time republican and they're not quite as excited as i think. they wanted to be or as the party wanted them to be about mitt romney so it was really interesting let's i was walking around quite a bit yesterday and there was a candidate here who was being followed around everyone wanted to get his autograph get their picture taken with them i'll give you a hint it was not nine i'm talking of course about herman cain who had a little rise in prominence during the campaign early on so people are here to support romney to back romney but really you know there is still sort of working on being one hundred percent sold we have an interesting chart here that i want to bring attention to christine if we could bring that up the title is anyone anyone

but romney and you could see the various candidates the republican presidential candidates and we have michele bachmann rick perry herman cain new grudge rick santorum each of them has enjoyed their time in the limelight and you see mitt romney has kind of had this consistent following but not that kind of surge that we've seen for the others the other candidate that also has had a consistent following is of course ron paul christine can you describe and of course they are the ones with the loudest presence over there now how can you describe the difference in the supporters over there in tampa those that support romney and those that support ron paul. well it's such an interesting charla's and with any political contest it's almost one of those situations that if you combine all the best qualities with each of those candidates you'd have your perfect candidate people you know loved loved how rick perry shot straight and talked to

people like you know they were his neighbors they loved michele bachmann and some of her conservative arguments and some of rick santorum is conservative arguments we did hear from him last night here at the tampa bay times forum he had a primetime speaking slot that speaks loudly to the base and of course you need to rally the base you need to get the base out of their homes to vote but as we know post primary election when you know everybody speaking to some of those more conservative issues now for the general election and this is perhaps why mitt romney was the man for the job is because you also have to try to win those independent voters you have to try to win the people who maybe did vote for president obama four years ago and are unhappy so that's really what it's about and that's what mitt romney had better than i think any of those other candidates including ron paul is that he just had the ability i guess not so much to appeal to more people but not to offend the most amount of people christine thanks so much for keeping us updated over there in tampa that was our t. white house correspondent christine. well imagine being forced to take the day off

of work to attend a political event without pay that's exactly what employees of an ohio coal mine are saying happened to them miners at murray energy say the c.e.o. of their company left them no choice but to attend a romney campaign event here's romney thanking c.e.o. rob moore for attending. i'll tell you you've got a great boss he runs a great operation here and he was. right there is. about played me a tape of one of the ads that president obama has out there and i described my head he talks about how wonderful it is and how we're adding jobs in the coal industry and producing more coal and i thought you know how in the world can you go out there and just tell people things that are true this is a time for truth if you don't believe in coal if you don't believe in energy independence for america then say it now this is the same company that was found to

have violated several safety requirements after six miners were killed when a coal mine collapse back in two thousand and seven it also turns out the company has donated more than nine hundred thousand dollars to republican politicians to talk more about this i'm joined now by sabrina d.c. correspondent for the plain dealer welcome sabrina so i understand that you were one of the first public publications to cover this story can you tell us what you found out in covering it well basically some of the workers were not happy about having to go to that rally and they weren't happy about their shifts being canceled and and being asked to attend so the complain to a radio host in west virginia who asked rob moore who is the c.f.o. of murray energy about that on the air and moore said that that nobody was forced to go but yet it was mandatory and i believe we do have

a clip from that actual interview from mr moore if we could take a listen to that. we have the know workers that were forced to attend we had managers that communicated to our workforce that the attendance at the romney event was mandatory but no one was forced to attend the event. there it is from the man himself. from the c.e.o. of murray energy c.e.o. rob moore he's saying this was not mandatory or it was mandatory it was not forced at the end of the day what is the difference well i said i tried to ask them that and they did not respond so i think that perhaps they view being forced as having punishment afterwards because he did stress that nobody who failed to attend was punished so that's you know i'd say that's good that he didn't punish anybody for not going over i guess we should say he is

a little correction there see not. and you know this this is not the first time that this company has been under scrutiny back in two thousand and seven they were six miners were killed when a coal mine in utah collapsed and it was found reporters found that the company violated several health and safety violations can you tell us about that well really cover more ohio stuff and not utah mine disasters but you know the company has quite a record they've also you know if if you were to talk to the radio show host there's a lot of the folks there who feel that they are hit up for political donations to things and they're not too happy about that either some of them i mean of course many of them agree with with mr murray the head of the company and you know do support that agenda but you know not everybody does right any work employees that you spoke to that were happy to go and take the day off and not get paid now. it was that i got it you know what they're not going to you know necessarily call me

up right that roe. you know we actually we have another clip of mitt romney at this event let's take a listen to that. the president is taking the work requirement out of welfare. i mean we value work we're a society which celebrates hard work and we look to a government to make it easier for jobs to be created and people to go to work we do not look for a government tries to find ways to provide for people who are not willing to work and so i'm going to put work back into welfare and make sure that able bodied people get the jobs to do so. well there is kind of praising work ethic and bringing the work ethic back to the american people surrounded by people that presumably took the day off from work and didn't get paid it's a code to that rally that what do you give them some of them depended on what shift they were on some of some of them who were on an earlier shift you know got to work

all their shift and others you know get to work part of the shift and i believe they were told that they could make it up on overtime later war or whatever but that you got a lease they had that option but you find it a little bit ironic that here he is talking about work and then these people are priced that they the day off well yes and i think some of his point there was that you know that he's there to boost coal jobs and just the jobs in the mines and you know here are these folks who who you know wanted to work and were not being paid. ok. can employers do this i mean is it legal are there any legal ramifications for doing this can you be forced to attend a political event in a way is it kind of pushing your political views upon your employee i think that i think that somebody who is filing some sort of a complaint about it asking asking for a look at it but. i don't know i don't know if it's if it's legal or not i mean i suspect that the company would have looked into that prior to doing this i don't believe that the workers at that facility there are union workers i think that if

they had a contract you know they probably that might not be allowed but have issues like this political issues come up within that company before well i think issues involving requesting donations from employees have come up. you know i was told by some employees there that they are that with their paychecks they have received some political you know there's a lot of political material inserted with their paychecks you know suggesting that they support particular causes and things and this is a company that has also donated more than nine hundred thousand dollars i believe that's just to the republicans i am gains that's just in this election cycle two thousand and eleven two thousand and twelve i'm sure if you were to add up for the prior election cycles that would be significantly higher i mean that's just two years and do you see a conflict of interest in that well. you know company companies are allowed you know there's they are allowed to donate to who they want and you know if if if

murray energy and its employees support republicans you know they're that's their right to do so it's their right to do so the question is it is their right to force their employees to do so well. you know i think that that's. that's for others to decide i'm not i'm not the judge of these things well thank you for covering the story very interesting that was sabrina in d.c. correspondent for the plain dealer. well many on the left have criticized the g.o.p. for what they see as racially coded rhetoric but while they point the finger there are still some concerns about how the obama administration is affecting minorities while some blacks in the us have been able to progress during obama's term many problems and the african-american community have actually gotten worse that is some black leaders asking if obama is doing enough for black america our kids are mongol

endo has the story this is. the united states is a mess trash on the streets poverty and homelessness urban decay these unsightly scenes are really witnessed by the obama's fundraiser in los angeles but it's something new on the kaleb inner neighbors are faced with every day i think hearings that come down to a lower level and see what we're going through in a recent interview with black enterprise magazine president obama said he is not the president of black america he's a president of the united states of america still that hasn't satisfied people who believe he needs to do more to help african-americans in poor communities but they're going to what it is consistently fourteen fifteen percent and as high as twenty plus percent for african-american males that's that's a crisis. african-americans overwhelmingly supported president obama four years ago

but since then blacks in the u.s. have also been disproportionately affected by the economic downturn i've been living around here my whole life and i've just seen the structures crumble well the u.s. unemployment rate remains write a book eight percent the jobless rate for blacks is near great depression levels in places like los angeles one in five african americans is without work was born and i'm content. we don't know what the study. we don't know why on the strip anything here that i say that i'm not proud of we don't know that things are so bad the congressional black caucus and some black activists are demanding president obama take an oppressive move in earmarking programs and initiatives aimed at poor black communities while the obama's race campaign money in swank yellow neighborhoods but a new report shows the foreclosure crisis is now starting to wipe out much of the wealth black families work for over generations meantime grassroot activists report

that black voter enthusiasm is down but experts say he will get a majority of black supporters on his side thanks to his opponent's poor choice of words. on mitt romney and his using kind of racially coded language about welfare reform and other things it's doing his best to motivate the african-american community to get out the vote they did not want a culture of dependency dependency to continue to grow in our country behind their grumblings many black voters at a minute they're optimistic of the man they overwhelmingly supported in our family for not community three never out let me criticize our so-called black leadership when with the elected or. and if there is a silver lining in the past four years for african-americans black leaders praise obama for his. health care and education initiatives still many of them feel the president is taking their vote for granted i think the president is doing work

ridges job of speaking up on racial disparities not just in unemployment but in all walks of life and whether president walks a political tightrope over how to address issues affecting black communities people like john mckillop continue to hope change will come one day in los angeles removal in though far to the well for more on president obama in the african-american community paid to lindsay a presidential candidate from the party for socialism and liberation joins us now to welcome so what do you think do you think the president has done enough to help the african-american community. absolutely not you know i think the election of a black president meant a great deal to a lot of people it showed how far the struggle against racism has come and offered new hope the needs of the people of poor and working people and african-americans and finally be a priority of our government and you know obama himself campaigned in the banner of hope and change beacon people who held precisely this belief but it was

a lie you know for obama to really affect the kind of change that poor people and african-americans need you have to have a fundamentally different orientation policy he would have to fact all of the institutions of the very foundations initial structure of this country and more than that the capitalist system is a system that relies on the accumulation of misery and poverty of the for the masses on one end by the excess of wealth for the greedy few on the other and so as a result of the system we've seen not only the conditions for african-americans but for all working class people that period over the last few years since obama's been in office now as you have mentioned the african-american community played a huge role in actually getting obama elected because he did it signify this this whole message of hope and change but now would you say that is the african-american community disillusioned you know by by what the way things have actually played out during his presidency. i think so more and more and it's just a result of the reality that we're dealing with as i saw previous speakers mentioned you know the unemployment rate in the black community is more than twice

the national average you know there are all over the country there are you know ten million people who are facing foreclosures more than five million families have been foreclosed on invicta already a disproportionate number of the people being foreclosed on african-americans as well and i think that you see people realizing that it's the robot with the system as the result of the capitalist system and the government you know that obama cannot come through for them because obama is really representative of the capitalist system he's c.e.o. of the capitalist class right now he's not the president of the people ok you're speaking out against the capitalist system what then do you say is the better alternative well we're running a candidate as socialist we believe that and a different system a system that prioritizes the needs of people with social system over the over the the privatized any of the people over the profits of a few over the profits of the big corporations is the solution my self and jodi's story are running on a ten point program to bring about the change that real people working people need the number one point in our program is a job as a constitutional right we believe that every working person in this country has

a right to a job we believe that housing is a right free education is a right and go to p.s.l. web or if you like to find out more about our program and the socialist socialism which we're fighting for do you think america has a socialist system kind of and contrary to what many view as what makes america different from other countries. i mean if what makes america different from other countries is the extreme wealth disparity which i think many people recognize you know america has the most critical of the verity of any develop nation you know like in this country the whole thing public education is the thing you know it took so long to provide any kind of health care and it still will not go to universal health care but i think there's been a long there's been a long and vibrant struggle in this country that people his country of always been fighting for the things the working people need and that socialism is a system that provides the things the working people need so it's really you know is it something that people been fighting for all along ok so we see that african-americans at least to an extent are disillusioned with president obama

a lot of them worse off than they were prior to his election as president do you think that this will be reflected in how they vote with this coming election. well i think that the disillusionment is something that the u.s. couples class counts on first elections because it encourages people to either vote for the lesser of two evils which is you know a couple of days or cap with you ever going to press them for the next four years or drop out altogether you know that's why we're trying to provide a third option we're trying to get some people something to vote for instead of something to vote against so we're trying to get people to the polls to vote for the things that working people actually need you know we don't want people to disenfranchise themselves we don't want people to move and sell political process we're just trying to make the point that if you go to both revolution vote for fundamental and necessary change but we believe that real change is made in the streets we believe the people need to get organized and fight back and we've seen incredible fightback movements in african-american this past year i mean all across the country tens of thousands of people marched for justice for trayvon martin and people are marching against police brutality in each and every neighborhood all

across the country you know african and the african-american community is organizing and fighting back and i think that that is how change real change represent that represents the needs of interest of our people will be made last i want to ask you when it comes to now republican presidential candidate mitt romney or president obama who is seen as the lesser of the two evil as you say as you call them. who are lesser fields well i mean they both have the support of the catholic ruling class but i think that romney realized it was the port of races we've seen a lot of comments from romney and a lot of company from those in the r. and d. that kind of signal to the races that he is the one you should vote for because historically united states the ruling class has used racism to get working class white people just and against their own interests you know they can take away their jobs they can take away the factories but as long as you can say well you may be poor but at least you're not that guy you know at least you're not as or as the african-american that the least you know that they can keep them on their side they can say that what they have in common is their whiteness i think that romney is

definitely appealing to the racist vote this election and so you know a lot of good people lot of interface of people will stand with obama but you know i'm saying that there is a third option you can vote for real change you can vote for evolution and vote p.s.l. right now we are out of time thank you so much for coming on the show that was it a lindsey a presidential candidate from the party for socialism and liberation and that is going to wrap it up for this hour but for more on the stories we covered you can check out our you tube channel you tube dot com slash artsy america or check out our website our teeth dot com slash usa and you can also follow me on twitter at liz wahl we're back here and a half hour. later is that so much going to be a huge music major. difference or if you should it's occupations in regime change are among the most ordinary humans that are making ends meet you know every day.

you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for like you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm sorry welcome to the big picture.

stop and look at the current a bit unemployment the national debt. failing governments ask yourself does it really matter who with. with billions created daily you can gamble with your money or turn it into solid gold request the gold in some.