it depends on the freedom of citizens to speak their minds and assemble without fear. and all the rule of law all due process that guarantees the rights of all. president obama speaks about the freedom of speech at the u.n. general assembly but considering the past year and in particular the case against p.f.c. bradley manning and wiki leaks founder julian assange on just this a case of do as i say not as i do. meet and greet and come to new york and shop and then they go home you know at tremendous cost to

their old taxpayers without very much done and we know the annual assembly is supposed to harness international cooperation but some argue that this meeting is a waste of time and money i had little find out what if anything can get accomplished here. i get the feeling take a look at this that mitt romney has not been in too many too many while was also on the road side in the survey and you. don't believe everything you see on t.v. it turns out sixty percent of americans don't put much stock in the mainstream media coming up we'll ask why your confidence has fallen and where americans are turning. it's tuesday september twenty fifth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wahl and you're watching our t.v. we begin today with the united nations general. nations general assembly that

kicked off today in new york city president obama took to the stage and spoke out on several foreign policy issues reiterating his message of freedom throughout the middle east he spoke about the inspiration of the arab spring and the power of the people to take to the streets to topple dictators depends on the freedom of citizens to speak their minds and assemble without fear and on the rule of law and due process that guarantees the rights of all people in other words true democracy real freedom is hard work those in power have to resist the temptation to crackdown on dissidents. well president obama went on to say that the regime of syrian president bashar al assad must come to an end and that the u.s. which is willing to take action to ensure that the transition happens people everywhere long for the freedom to determine their destiny the dignity that comes with work the comfort that comes with faith and the justice that exists when

governments serve their people and not the other way around the united states of america will always stand up for these aspirations. burren people for people all across the world and while these powerful words acco throughout the room we question if they seem at odds in the wake of some recent events a diplomatic standoff between the u.k. and britain is leaving wiki leaks whistleblower julian assange holed up in the ecuadorian embassy in london he's been there since mid june and it looks like he'll be there indefinitely assad is wanted in sweden for alleged sexual assault charges but he and his supporters say it's an attempt to ultimately get him extradited to the u.s. and face charges for releasing thousands of secret documents on his whistle blowing website this as accused whistleblower bradley manning remains behind bars for allegedly allegedly turning over top secret documents to wiki leaks is accused of aiding the enemy and has been locked up for over two years supporters of assad and

manning believe they are simply exercising their free speech and shining a light on government wrongdoing of the foreign ministers of ecuador and the u.k. will meet later this week in hopes of finding some resolution to the diplomatic impasse between the two countries. as well at that time of year again every year at this time world leaders flock to new york city to participate in the u.s. but aside from dramatic speeches and high profile appearances what actually gets done at these meetings are to correspond on a stasi a target that explores. there is no fooling the clock every september every year the big apple turns into a beehive buzzing with leaders from all over the world. and houghton streets already overflowing with tourists clogged up yes it is inconvenient for new yorkers yes it does traffic yes it does make it harder to get good restaurant reservations

but it's also one of the things that makes new york city a fascinating place over one hundred ninety countries make up the un general assembly delegations from those countries often made up of dozens of diplomats flock to new york for the annual gathering of great minds that meet the world go round ride around in town cars and eat at the four seasons and when i see the suits and on some of these diplomats and i think isn't that the country where i just saw forty children died last night these are the leaders of that country wearing gucci suits and eating at the at the u.n. traditionally there's at least one diplomatic point of contention from iran to libya to palestine and israel concerns rotate on this international arena but with the assembly session seen by critics as a ritual rather than a forum for real exchange deal we meet and greet and come to new york and shop and then they go home you know at tremendous cost to their own taxpayers without very

much done those closely following the u.n. developments wonder if political crises will be tackled at the annual the u.n. is increasingly unable to solve even not the highest profile problems problems with you would you would expect the u.n. to be able to play a role on this here syria is the elephant in the room syria gives them a reason to be here and they'll be lip service paid and ultimately there will be money will go and there will be skirmishes and arms and there will be. throwing rhetoric all the raging syrian crisis maybe stealing headlines you. specter to be resolved as leaders meet behind these walls the sides on syria are so far apart there's no reason to think just bring they tried in geneva in june so you know new york in september is not i think is even less likely to reach any kind of common output i think at this point the proponents of change in syria are just hoping they can win it on the ground. accusations passions and theatrical fly high during

speeches made here they're not really coming here the idea of you know kind of singing kumbaya and promoting world peace it's in a way you know a kind of show and tell arena where people get up and say the right things but now there's no follow up there's no real urgency winston churchill once said for minutes to hours long speeches are mostly broadcast in the country of the leader addressing the assembly with cases of some simply remaining oblivious journalists from around the world follow their country's leaders every step meanwhile with each passing year the u.s. means she media dedicates less airtime to the u.n. one thing that's different this year makes it even less effective general assembly is the us election so having obama not that he's a magic man or anything but he's coming from even less time than previous years curious details can largely go unnoticed of in a couple could it thousand a year and i think some of these cool leaders are trying to come in either by mistake or not they're going to ban ki moon is going to be greeting the coup leaders delegates flocked to the big apple every time for an array of reasons to

get face time for pure symbolism to wreak havoc and create scandal or to force through a political agenda but as drama on rivals at the podium it's unclear exactly how efficient this annual extravaganza actually is especially turkana or treat. let's talk more about the significance or maybe in significance of the u.n.g.a. are to correspond turkana joins us now. so for us i guess want to ask you the latest coming out of the meetings well as you know every year traditionally drama on mad men. it's our the number one guest to r.s.v.p. to the six travel ganz and really the number one guests who show up literally right now it's impossible in the un vicinity to turn a corner without bumping into dozens of wide eyed people trying to get to one meeting or another there are hundreds of photo ops taking place at the united nations in the next couple of days over one hundred ninety speeches so it's really hard and of work really to try to keep the eye out on the things that actually

matter instead of some of the decorations and acts that some of the leaders traditionally like to present to the several days that they're here for the international community and today of course is just day one the general debate session is only getting started and so far we're expecting more madness and more headlines to be attractive to the united nations so far we did out of key speeches here from france not really much new information there france still calling courtly for the syrian president to step down we also heard from barack obama of course who is curiously not holding any biological meetings here this year however he did to find the time to appear on the daytime my talk show the view this is been getting some some trouble for him really because people are saying well this is the united states this is the u.s. president shouldn't he use this opportunity to hold some meetings that is not being the case at all obama did talk during his speech about the video that is spiking

outrage throughout the middle east he called it crude and disgusting but he did underline still that he believes that america's ideal of freedom of speech is very important and this is something that should play a role in calming down the so-called mindless violence in the days to come tomorrow we're expecting mahmoud ahmadinejad to speak always entertaining so definitely a lot more to come in the in the in the days to come out of the united nations so i guess a lot to look forward to we as you had mentioned we have a lot of world leaders all in one place a lot of hype surrounding this event but on to something else what can they actually accomplish. well it's a difficult question liz when we have so many leaders really speaking at each other instead of to each other during this gathering and for journalists it's particular curious every year we're expecting to see whether they're in the backroom deals the more important meetings that take place throughout the madness when leaders do get

together for one on one meetings were always on the lookout to see if there will be some sort of compromise found on some yet another issue or maybe more tensions will begin to rise as a result of an unsuccessful and you know disagreements that take place in the back room deals being made and these are of course the more curious things that happened during the general assembly session is these meetings that most of which the journalists don't really hear about and the topics change you know the expectations dwindle year in and year out and many experts say well look at the bottom line is that it's kind of naive to expect to any real breakthroughs to take two to happen in the one week that they're all here so do you think these meetings that we are seeing on t.v. or over time they've lost their relevance and just has become more of a formality. well no the meetings themselves have and whether the united nations general assembly session is beginning to kind of dwindle in the eyes of those who are watching because it is a big question because if we remember of course every year there is an issue that the international community and the journalists and the experts are looking out to

be solved we've seen you know israel and palestine libya iran syria but as we of course realize is all of these issues are still very much on the table burning and unresolved and in terms of the relevance of the united nations some are comparing it to high school really these sessions that take place every year we're seeing the bullies we're seeing the more popular crowd we're seeing the shy kids we're seeing the outsiders and the most important issues that make the headlines year in and year out at least in the last five years or so really seem to continue to be on the table the one thing that's stable is that all of these kids come back every year to create more drama here in new york that's an interesting comparison you make there also right now you had mentioned president obama he is not meeting with world leaders and said he decided to go on the view and i guess has other priorities of course it is election year so that kind of has as well as you know they're

preoccupied with this year does it make the u.n. g.a. even less newsworthy i think that's exactly the case you know where especially for the mainstream media of course because it's so traditional for the mainstream channels that are out the united nations when obama is here they're here there are dozens of live trucks outside the u.n. everybody is running around trying to cover every single step he makes inside those walls but the less time he spends here the less time the united nation gets on the airwaves and that's really unfortunate in a sense because a lot of americans are left without the information of what goes on within the international community because some expects words are saying that obama of. right now is more concerned with getting votes at home and is not wanting to be seen as a sort of internationalist when he needs to take care of issues at home but it still these issues are affecting the united states directly what's going on in the

middle east is affecting the united states directly so critics are saying it would be a good idea for him to be here a little longer and to get more news to bring more news to the american people really in the sense that he should have taken the opportunity to strike some more backroom deals and certainly less less news for the mainstream if he's here just jumping in and out of the building. thank you so much for staying on top of everything over there that was our t. correspondent an associate. i also had an artsy how do you try to break a story first and get the facts straight while sixty percent of americans say not american mainstream media i had a look at why viewers are losing confidence in the media.

here is mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that we americans call i don't know. i'm sorry i'm just a guy who cares an awful lot of money you sir are a fool you know what kind of smart there are terror cells in your neighborhood i want you to listen to feature a me on limbaugh and the christian public you. can see really sort of the. you know folks are going to distract us from what you and i should care about because they're profit driven industry that sells a sensationalistic garbage he calls it breaking news i'm having martin and we're

going to break the spell. a lot of american power continues. might actually be time revolution. i mean true indulge in

a particular drink at starbucks or the surprising him really you. hope you don't believe everything you see on t.v. you are not alone turns out that americans trust of the u.s. media has hit a record low take a look at his recent gallup poll sixty percent of those polled say they have little or no trust in the u.s. media to report the news fully accurately and fairly the survey was conducted between september sixth and september night so why are americans losing the faith well there's this. the individual mandate has been ruled unconstitutional justices have just got it both the centerpiece provision of the obama health care law if in fact that's the final word on the individual mandate

there could be a little bit more complicated what do you get from a shutdown reading through this again i we are reading now that the entire law has been held. and other times it seems like the twenty four hour news cycle is producing less than critical headlines i have to get the feeling take a look at this mitt romney has not been in too many too many. decided that something in your state is a quick look at what president obama's been up to our area is sitting down with the pirates making sure he didn't forget to mark the international talk like a pirate you know celery actually emits a hormone in and that actually tracks women fans are going crazy over these must have seven years a look at penn state back to eight hundred ninety six the question for you this morning where was god in aurora. now let's talk more about what is going on in the mainstream media and why americans are liking at i'm guy now that you are ten university journalism professor christopher christopher a nice to see you again all

right so we have approval ratings for the media at a record low why are americans growing and happy with the media well there are two stories here one pretty negative and pretty cynical and some of it we've seen before and some that's actually pretty promising the introduction of the story you saw just multiple illustrations of not just how. unfair and biased certain outlets are but that the overarching problem is not the any kind of political bent but the kind of dumbing down of the news product and news content all the way around you know not just least common denominator programming for you know that the you know we want to reach the biggest morons so we can sell our advertising to them the content has has been watered down to bite sized chunks so that there can be sort of a of a messaging thing with advertising so that there can be. it can fit the corporate

model so you're investing less in the news products you can rehash it more toss it off to the evening talk shows you know just just just dumb i mean it doesn't get much simpler than that dumb sells dumb is cheap so dumb is what's going to lead and so you have that you people are turned off by that the other part is you go it goes back to the bias sort of thing and you do have segments of this population and the gallup polls particularly republicans that the drop was was precipitous i mean it was big with people who are identified as democrats but with republicans it was it was a cliff that was that was left off of and and and that is that can be attributed really to paranoia. about news coverage i mean they don't think that their story is being told their story might be the result of again paranoia commune of dissidents they just cannot imagine somebody like the president being the president conspiracy

theories but there are some stories that are legitimate such as some of the things that happened in libya but i mean for the most part it is just the psychic and. sociological sort of of block that they have and so you know because they feel they're their story isn't being told their drop is even more precipitous but then you see the people identify as democrats so it's partisanship and stupidity if you want to boil it down to those two stories and you had mentioned republicans seem to be more unhappy in addition to republicans also independents were out there might even that as well there is more the you know the stupidity of the news product that the content is is being molded to a cheaper and cheaper and cheesy or. deliveries not only delivery system but the content itself sorry you know so you have the every system might be some host driven show that gets the toss from the news shows during the day but the new shows

aren't covering anything hard and doing any analysis at all so that stuff gets kicked up to the talk shows where the real opinions and fights and theatrically are taking place and independents get turned off by that so for them it's not it is the quality of the content that's being compromised for people who are more partisan it is that is that typical trend that we've seen especially from the election two thousand and eight and then has just gone supernova the last two years the bright spot however is that the how independents are treated does become that intro to the bright spot in the bright spot is it's a global phenomenon that younger people say ages twenty five that demo and younger are there to. being out of the of the mainstream media but they're looking at other delivery systems other technological you know other means of looking at t.v. look you don't need a t.v. as our t. says the watch t.v.

they're looking at alternative news sources that can do and independent reporting and then that independent report is put on digital platforms primarily in social media and blasted out to everybody and it's a handheld universe as well a lot of the people who are upset about the media especially in that republican demographic it tends to skew old and these are people who are going to now right wing web sites to find news and it's not really news a lot of it is gossip and conspiracy theories so they've abandoned t.v. and newspapers and gone to these sites but these sites aren't really given the news either younger people are abandoning t.v. to some extent newspapers but the sites of the newspapers they're still following for the original stories that they can then put on social media and blast out to their friends and constituent groups so it's interesting it's an interesting phenomenon that the findings in this recent survey does that you think is now gives

an opportunity for other media outlets aside from the mass media outlets to step in and claim are all oh sure i mean you have you have outlets such as r.t. that are taking a bigger share i mean not just traditional t.v. but the social media digital aspect of t.v. where you don't need a t.v. you can watch it in your palm of your hand. and current t.v. and other you know you have the launch of huffington post's live station on the on the right wing sort of speak you have pajamas media and some of the smaller breitbart outlets that are starting their own web t.v. stations so you know you have something for that crowd as well but for the most part you're seeing a traditional model where you have traditional t.v. that's that's that's breaking the news. it sending out for you know doing original reporting you have. sites such as pro publica neiman labs that are doing their own original reporting and traditional magazines that have gone digital like mother

jones but more or less they're doing all the original reporting and they are feeding the social media platforms that shoot it out to you know people who are you know looking for this who are trying to mind this is this content and you know and they're staying away from from curation to i mean some of these sites are basically curating other people's work while they're going directly to these new media outlets that are doing original reporting and then shooting it out through social media directly to the universe not some site in collects that curated like garc or something like that i mean you know that's that's what you see and what we're seeing at georgetown with the metrics that gallup looked at is that people are doing that kind of curation thing for you know to look for entertainment or sports or gossip but for news they're looking at these new outlets that are put it doing original reporting and then putting it on social media and blasting it out into the universe so that that's the promising side that's the none cynical side

and lastly do want to ask you because we are in the thick of everything in terms of the election it's an election year and it is there in the election year is that more people do you usually turn. to find out what's going on you know on the national level but this survey also found that less people are turning in to national politics turning into line about national politics on the news this year as opposed to two thousand and eight why do you think that is well you have i think sort of it's fatigue because you've had pacs and super pacs and other organizations that have been. you know it used to be peppering the public airwaves now it's blanketing suffocating shrouding with with largely negative ads so there's there's suffocation there there's that. fatigue in suffolk so if a cation factor but i think a lot of it is people are looking at these alternate news sources they might tune in for a story on t.v.

or read some in the newspaper or go on the magazine or newspaper site but then they take the initial information and boom they're looking at what people are tweeting. or going on you tube to find the full video rather than the gloss over the you might have seen on the host driven show. pleasure as always we are going to have time that was christopher chambers journalism professor at georgetown university coming up next on our tears the capital account with lauren lister let's check in with lauren to see what is on today's agenda lauren what are you working on over there i list today we're going to talk about a vicious little cycle which our guest aptly calls benny robbing from timmy to pay to me and in this case benny would be ben bernanke at the fed and to me would be our friend timothy geithner over at the treasury were talking of course about the fed buying the government bonds issued by the treasury which then the treasury uses to pay down the debt to finance the deficit at a low levels so it's a very vicious cycle that maybe people aren't as aware of the impacts and we're

going to talk about it right that's all coming up next on the capital account with lauren lester thanks lauren that's going to do it now for the news but you can always check out our you tube channel you tube dot com slash r t america our website our t.v. dot com slash usa follow me on twitter as well we'll be back here and a half hour. i've . not.

easy to be. easy to. see.