so they are to use a u.s. district judge is blocking indefinite military detention for american citizens judge catherine forrest says the n d a violates the us constitution and journalistic freedoms we'll bring you the latest on this case. and just when the economy seems to be recovering the u.s. census bureau says that income inequality is growing and poverty rates are stagnant with one in five children falling below that law and dr cornel west and tavis smiley will be coming into the studio to discuss this disturbing trend. plus they are two similar cases with two very different outcomes the alleged wiki leak or

bradley manning awaits a trial for treason while u.v.'s whistleblower bradley birken found is awarded millions for his truth telling i had will compare the treatment of the two brown please. it's thursday september thirteenth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall and you're watching r t. well a victory today for reporters and activists fighting the controversial indefinite detention law a federal judge has ruled that the government cannot enforce a provision that allows the military to detain those who support terrorists and associated forces those two words associated forces are key that's because the plaintiffs in this case against the government a group of seven reporters and activists say they believe they may fall under this category by reporting on the middle. they say under the n.d.a.

they could be indefinitely detained because their jobs sometimes require them to interact with terrorists the judge granted the temporary injunction back in may that put a temporary block on that part of the law but federal judge catherine forrest has now made that order permit to discuss what this all means for your rights i'm joined now by kevin to solo blogger with firedoglake kevin welcome so first i want to ask you the significance of this ruling not just for the plaintiffs but for the american people. first in the last couple hours age four let your viewers know that the obama administration is appealing this ruling and that's being submitted right now so i think it's important for people to know as we discuss this that the permanent injunction is being challenged by think the major significance that needs to be six discussed is the fact that a federal judge decided to intervene and make this sort of ruling on behalf of

journalists activists writers to take seriously the sort of fears that they were discussing openly in court and then also understand that the government did not meet the burden of proof that this was in fact a tool that could be used for law enforcement efforts and to also demonstrate that they had specifically laid out exactly how this would be used so that it would not violate people's first amendment rights or their right to due process kevin that's an interesting new development that you bring us will talk a little bit more about that in a second i do want to bring up a quote from the ruling from discern judge katherine forces say it's quote due deference does not a limit the judicial obligation to rule on properly presented constitutional questions courts must safeguard core constitutional rights a long line of supreme court precedent and here set of fundamental principle and unequivocal language so kevin can you talk more about the parts of this law that

raise questions of constitutionality. well the main part was these words where they were saying you know if you could be connected to being associated for sir if you could be seen to have provided substantial support or if you could have been found to approve provided direct support to al qaeda or any affiliated terrorist groups that are part of the united states war on terrorism then that would make it possible for the president to order that you would be indefinitely detained by the military and these individuals these places which were people like chris hedges who is a well known journalist who has a background of working with the new york times and publishes stuff work disappeared you know books that are being published by the nation and also the theory which is that she's

a icelandic parliamentarian and then another journalist elects o'bryant these individuals who have engaged in work are worried that by going to interview certain individuals they could be accused of associating with them because of what they might publish i guess could be construed to be sympathetic to these people and all the united states government basically has to do is is place them under detention because they suspect something and then they would be detained for the duration of the time that you are at war and so that is very problematic for people who are worried about their rights and you just mentioned haven't it chris hedges that one of the plaintiffs in this case we had on the shelf not too long ago a talking about the very thing you were discussing let's take a listen to what he had to say. it removes due process for anybody who is deemed

not just a terrorist but to have contact with these associated forces that's not a term that's to find it's nebulous it's quite a frightening piece of legislation so as you just pointed out both just pointed out there both in the plaintiff's fear that even reporting on terrorists could be considered grounds for being detained under this law because another back provision has been blocked are you satisfied with the n.b.a. as it stands. i mean i think that the main issues that these people were raising were encapsulated in the main section and i think that you know they never were concerned with the whole thing as a whole because there's always going to be national defense authorization act every budgetary measure that is used by the country so they weren't just taking a stand against the way that wars are funded also there are certainly peace activists out there that do not like the continuation of wars but in this case they

were fundamentally worried about how this could be used to curb people who were gauged in first amendment activities they were worried that their due process would be violated and so you know they seeing that congress wasn't going to take action to stop this unchecked executive power seeing that the for us wasn't going to pursue their concerns as valid they themselves decided to do something activist oriented and filed a lawsuit and they just so happened to succeed in a way that many people never thought they actually were going to be. ok and you had mentioned earlier the newest development in this case the government has filed an appeal kevin what does that mean. how how do you expect this to play out with that new development. but i would as i would presume with the appeal that we're going to go on to another court i'm not sure what judge or you know where exactly is going

to land but it certainly just emphasizes the fact that this government believes that it should have the tool of preventive military military detention in its arsenal it also is illogical what they're doing they're making an argument in court i think this should be mentioned quickly there they've made an argument in court that they already had this power in the authorized use for military force against terrorists that bush signed that they could actually detain people and i think they might even argue that they could detain people like chris hedges if they wanted to which kind of makes you wonder what the the big fuss is in court but what they're doing with the n.c.a.a. was trying to reaffirm it and also trying to make it more apparent and i think they just object to the judge checking their power and so they're going to continue because they don't want to stand that these activists have gone into the courtroom

and made it so that they're constrained and so yes i think going forward we're just going to see a reaffirmation of the fact that our government that the united states government believes it should have this ability to detain people indefinitely which is a strong statement about the nature of government right now all right a very important case a very serious ramifications kevin really appreciate you coming on the show i weigh in on it i was coming to soul and blogger with fire dog lake. well here at r t we've been on the front lines of the so-called war on whistleblowers however government treatment of one leaker has forced us to rename it as the war on some whistleblowers artie's own christine for example delve deep into the case of bradley reverses bradley and brings us more about the government's complicated relationship with whistleblowers. during the last three and a half years an old law has been dusted off and taken off the shelf time and time

again i'm talking about the espionage act and in the days of mccarthyism in the so-called red scare it was used to charge julius and ethel rosenberg they were convicted and executed back in the one nine hundred fifty s. other than them the law has been used only twice and that is until president obama came into office he has used it a total of six times so if you're doing the math that's three times in history before two thousand and eight and six additional times after is a move that's prompted many people both inside and outside the legal community to say that president obama has launched a war on whistleblowers. the obama administration as you pointed out has doubled the number of prosecutions against its own employees using the espionage act for whistle blowing in addition the government has also gone out of between to use a number of extra legal tools against whistleblowers whose cases don't rise to the level of the espionage act or in cases where there's not enough evidence or the

government doesn't want to make a big deal out of it this is something that it's created a war in washington it's going on just below or noses but it is indeed a struggle well it turns out that struggle may be diminishing at least for some this week a banker named bradley burke unfelt who worked at the swiss bank u.b.s. was awarded one hundred four million dollars for blowing the whistle on a scandal that involved the financial giant helping thousands of the wealthiest people in america hide their fortunes in secret swiss bank accounts why on earth with these americans want to hide their money well to avoid paying taxes of course let me backtrack a moment before this award broken feld was actually serving time in prison he's still on house arrest charged with conspiracy to defraud the united states for his role in u.b.s. actions but he came forward and told the justice department what he knew hoping to get protection under the whistleblowers act protection he wasn't granted until now

today i want to take a look at the case of two bradleys bradley bergenfield and bradley manning and bradley work involves story has a happy ending because he's part of the i.r.s. as whistleblower program he's one of several people who are starting to collect large sums of money because their secrets have brought millions of dollars in lost tax revenue to the government his account alone brought forth more than seven hundred eighty million dollars in fines paid by u.b.s. not to mention all those other people who are starting to come forward to wait for it pay those taxes they owed in the first place in fact many of the united states financial investigations depend on whistleblowers to make their cases broadly. manning well he's a different story the trove of documents he shared with wiki leaks did not bring money to the u.s. government's bank account instead it exposed embarrassing secrets and allowed the entire world to see the way to u.s. military pilots treated war like a video game instead of cold hard cash manning gets

a cold hard prison cell for more than eight hundred days manning has been awaiting trial in conditions the united nations torture chief called cruel and unusual if he ever gets beyond those prison walls it's unlikely he'll see a payout of any kind despite providing the public with valuable information about their government meanwhile work involved who actually took part in the scheme he blew the whistle on we'll be able to buy new homes or islands or any sort of therapy he needs it just goes to show that the war on whistleblowers has a convience it's not whether you will the whistle but who you blow the whistle on that determines if you're an asset or an adversary in washington christine for south r.t. . also ahead here on our team we are going to have dr cornel west and tavis smiley in the studio don't go anywhere.

here's mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that the americans call a dollar. short. here's an awful lot of money for you sorry our little you know what kind of mind terrorist cells in your neighborhood all want the usa to feature in the uk the only liberal democrats. can secure the support of the. you know the corporate media distracts us from what you and i should care

about because they're a profit driven industry that sells a sensationalistic garbage he calls it breaking news i'm out to martin and we're going to break this that. please. old poverty continues to plague america as poverty rates remain stuck at record levels this reality confirmed by a census report released yesterday shows fifteen percent of the u.s. population living in poverty more than forty six million americans live below the poverty line and one in five children live in poverty and with that rate stuck that rate we just saw is stuck out what it was the year before so it didn't get worse but it didn't get better it remains historically high meanwhile the income inequality gap is growing this is based on the guinea and acts which measures

household income inequality it ranges from zero which means total equality to one hundred which represents total any equality in two thousand and eleven it reached a record high of forty seven point seven percent here now to talk about what this means for the nation a dual very outspoken about these issues will also dive into other pressing topics facing the u.s. today cornel west and tavis smiley joins us now welcome gentlemen to the both of you great to have you here so first want to start off you know president obama he has repeatedly said it it could have been worse and we just saw those figures they're stuck at these record highs should we just be thankful that it's not worse i mean it didn't necessarily get better but it didn't get worse no i think that the level. of shame and the moral disgrace you know i think we got to x. in a fight back that says that we're going to come up with a way that in which the oligarchs who have a disproportionate amount of power they were good because oligarchs anywhere you

are in the world have a disposal mount of power need to be accountable to make sure that poor people especially poor children of all colors can live lives of decency and dignity. we have president obama he has been dubbed the food stamp president by republicans do you think that he's done enough to address the issue of poverty in the u.s. or you didn't really. other than the health care bill that is about it no major speech no major focus no major highlight of the issues of poverty that's one reason why i was on this poverty tour to make sure that in america there's a color conscious and says that we are going to have massive investment in jobs with a living wage and decent housing decent education i want to ask i guess the same question to you well what do you think about president obama's track record in terms of dealing with poverty they certainly could be a lot better when he ran four years ago for the white house he said then that he wanted to eradicate poverty in america not enough done since then he said he wanted

to raise the minimum wage to nine fifteen are in this country we have a minimum wage but not a living wage and that we should be much further along in that fight congress right now ought to be taking up a bill to raise the minimum wage but when you suggested earlier that these numbers have not gotten worse i'm glad you came to the to the second part of the study because what we do know is that the gap between those the top in those the bottom is widening as we see it are booked out of the rich and the rest of us the gap between the have gotten the have nots continues to widen but it's not even just these poverty numbers this week it's the job numbers on top of that from last week that we do swim it's on top of that the report from the agriculture department that said the other day that tonight in this country the richest nation in the world fifty million people will go to bed hungry non-meat of them children on top of that it's a report from the capital kids foundation here in the nation's capital the fires that child poverty in washington the nation's capital is worse than in mexico the

point is the data keep coming at us day in and day out that poverty is the new america norm it's threatening our democracy it's a matter of national security so by any in d.c. one has to understand that poverty is a major problem that we've got to get addressed in this country and if we are in an election year what can the candidates focus on still to help this problem poverty in the last and prevent. gap this income inequality gap from widening well we've got to make sure that they hit the issue of poverty head on talk about a fairly clear mitt romney very much a right wing candidate very much called open to wealth inequality increasing decreasing taxes on the well to do but we've got to put pressure on obama and we've got to create a social movement we need organize and mobilize people some of whom are willing to hit the streets and go to jail to bear witness to the plight of poor people sort of reshape the public conversation and we see just how serious what these numbers coming out proving how serious and pervasive the problem and poverty in the last

really is do you think that this is discussed enough in the media or live not at all not at all in fact i was one of the few advocates in the mass media who hits his head on and of course the debate coming to us that's a key issue be have these four debates coming of course three presidential as you know one vice presidential just back up to two thousand and eight when obama ran the first time he and john mccain had three presidential debates in those three debates the word poor poverty did not come up one time this is the guy who want to be the leader of the free world not mentioning of the word not one time obama didn't raise it mccain didn't raise the moderators didn't ask about it so fast forward four years two of those moderators from four years ago are back on the debate stage this time but look how much worse probably in this country is so that the moderators in these debates mr mayor will miss crowded news rattus mr schieffer have got to put this issue of poverty front and center in the american people can

push them since they're representing us essentially to raise the issue of poverty mr romney mr obama need to have added over the issue of poverty and what they each are going to do about it but that only happens if those moderators push that issue and if those of us in the media get less concerned about covering the horse race as it were and more concerned about talking about the issues that ought to be discussed in this horse race and it's interesting about the horse race i think it's more apparent especially. in an election year with he said she said whoever said what but why do you why don't you think that this it's a very important issue why isn't it discussed more simple reason the poor do not vote at the same level as the elite the poor don't make big campaign contributions the poor don't have a lobbyist up and down k. street here in washington defending their point of view and the poor as a result being rendered invisible because both parties are owned by big money big business big banks so that didn't leave much room for poor people to express themselves so you got to get out on the poverty tour and beat the drum bring the

bill pick your metaphor to try to get people to pay attention to this issue and so that's why we're out here trying to get this issue boosted higher on the american agenda called the media won't talk about it the way they should say or centrally saying that poor people don't matter to politicians because they don't necessarily help them get a real reelected with that of course is why you that the poor people don't matter to corporate media or the corporate media itself is too intimate with the big money big banks and big corporations that they've got to get alternative voices in the american media it is rather amy goodman and others but not enough. very interesting and connecting the dots they're. seeing that what is being covered what is getting a lot of hype right now the unveiling of the i phone five and wanted to kind of bring that into the conversation here because we're seeing more and more people getting ahold of these devices that make your life more easier you know i have

a thirteen year old cousin that has an i phone it's i mean i could i'm going to madden having one i mean being able to help you research and navigate and do things a lot more easily and we have this population or it's becoming mainstream for them to get a hold of this kind of technology and we have those that simply cannot get ahold of this technology and i mean what do you think that does i mean when we have a technology gap it is it ultimately perpetuating this inequality. well it it tends to but for me i'm much more concerned about the quality of the persons who are using the technology if you get the technology you want to recheck or if you get the technology will listen the duke ellington if you want to be informed by alternative voices that can be a beautiful thing the sad thing is the soup the superficiality of the culture is reflected in the superficial choices that people make given the technology that they have so in that regard you need something internally need something in the inside of one and that has to do with courage and vision and discipline and sacrifice and everybody has access to these phones nowadays if they can afford an i

phone five everybody has something that they're using the real problem though is addition what dr was just said brilliantly is that this technology boom has not made black for wealthy it's not made hispanics wealthy you know so the point is there's still the same particular group and class of people who become billionaires off of this technology now that begrudging anybody who comes up with a good idea making a bunch of money all i'm suggesting is that this technological revolution that somebody told us was going to you know to level the playing field in this country hasn't done exactly that as yet. i do want to shift the conversation a little bit dr west i know you've been an outspoken opponent of this stop and frisk program and the n.y.p.d. i believe even got arrested because of vets. a lot of people saying that this program is racially motivated and that you scored somewhat a victory and getting a court date on this i mean are you confident that policies like this i know that

this is a fight that you're fighting can be done away with what we had a weeklong trial we had a guilty verdict we'd already gone to jail so that covered the time spent there in jail but most importantly right now there is a good ten thousand whistles being blown in new york city all across the five boroughs focusing on this arbitrary police power against young people no matter what color but they're disproportionately black and brown there's been a thirty four percent. crease in stop and frisk because of the purses that we've brought to bear again going to the streets and going to jail and i think this social action in this social motion and movement more and more is making a difference because of the political paralysis that we're experiencing it has to do with prison enough to compress mass incarceration. chicago very important to our solidarity with the teachers there against the city all of these are for me right back to me really interesting and really appreciate you both coming into the studio that was dr cornel west and tavis smiley authors of the rich and the rest of us in

poverty manifesto. coming up next in the capital account with lauren lister let's check in with lauren to see what she has on today's agenda lauren what can we look forward say their eye lids while you were just talking about poverty and you know it's a great time to talk about that in light of the fed's decision today the fed announced more q we essentially what you could call q.e. infinity they didn't give a timeline for their efforts to essentially print money they're going to buy mortgage backed securities in this case to the tune of forty billion dollars a month now they say this is targeted towards improving the labor market and that they won't stop short of that improvement that once they see that improvement they make keep continuing but that's what they're aiming for but listen i have a question for you because the fed is expanding its balance sheet to the tune of two trillion dollars since the financial crisis what is unemployment right now it's not very good i know that much larger yeah it's eight percent what was it back then

above eight percent so if there are using these methods to try to boost unemployment you might ask why because it really hasn't proved successful yet and yet there are plenty of unintended consequences of these kind of measures liz we don't know how the fed is going to unwind this we've never seen this kind of balance sheet expansion ever before this dbase is the dollar the currency. that you and i and everybody watching in the u.s. at least all use and that is the global reserve currency a lot of trade across the world is conducted in not only that it crushes savers people on fixed income they can't get any return on their investment or their savings because interest rates are stuck at zero percent this will continue ben bernanke he told us and probably until two thousand and fifteen and i know you are going to be on your show to explain to your viewers why they should care here on our show they can hear from mark fodder about why he cares that's a word we look forward to that are five pm lauren thanks that's coming up next on

the capital account but for more on the stories we cover check out our you tube channel you tube dot com slash r t america where you can follow me on twitter at liz wahl back here in a half hour. more news today violence is once again. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. showing corporations rule the day. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something

else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harvey welcome to the big picture. the for.