despite months of wrangling the us went off the fiscal cliff when the new year old drive for congress finally reached a deal they claim is good for the country is it really though it will dive into the law congress just passed and see who the real winners and losers are. and it was a massive superstorm that caused billions of dollars of damage in new york and new jersey before the hundred twelfth congress came to an end the house g.o.p. punted on hurricane sandy relief so what does this mean for the states and residents left in the dark by their own government. and the pentagon has a problem the u.s.

relies on drones to conduct warfare around the world now they've launched a sixteen million dollar effort to prevent high tech flying machines from being hacked so how serious of a problem is this for the u.s. drone program. it's wednesday january second happy new year five pm in washington d.c. i'm meghan lopez and you're watching r.t. . topping the news this hour well they've done it again in literally an eleventh hour deal the u.s. house of representatives passed a fiscal cliff budget deal that president obama is expected to sign into law so that's that crisis averted cue the confetti right well actually not even close the u.s. might have avoided an economic calamity in the short run but the future of the country is still as uncertain as it was before if not even more so let's take

a look at the scorecard does the u.s. need its fiscal cliff deadline of midnight december thirty first to avoid financial repercussions nope despite the fact that congress had almost a year to act it missed its deadline by a day luckily stark stock markets were closed on new years and are doing quite well today as a result of the newly signed deal and then there's the whole retroactive agreement thing meaning that congress can decide if it didn't in fact go over the fiscal cliff when the truth is that technically it did so what about the automatic spending cuts known as sequestration or at the crux of the crisis no final decision on how much to cut and where to cut from has been delayed only by a couple of months what's more sequester ration could be even harsher on military programs if the deficit and debt agreement are not reached between congress and the white house by this new deadline so did the deal raise the desired amount of

revenue to please both republicans and democrats a big fat no on that one and president obama had a real back on his campaign promise to raise taxes on all people making two hundred fifty thousand dollars or more did the cliff deal put the u.s. on a long term path to crease the deficit as was the plan. not even close in fact president obama spoke in very harsh words to congress last night about paying its bills. on time did avoid a tax increase on the employed not really it might have raised only taxes on the people making four hundred fifty thousand dollars or more but it did not address the payroll tax increases at all meaning that seventy seven percent of americans will be paying more in federal taxes come two thousand and thirteen and if you make about fifty thousand dollars a year just for an example you can expect to see your taxes increase by about a thousand dollars so despite the fact that congress is breathing

a sigh of relief today things are as desperate as ever the u.s. could still end up going over the fiscal cliff after all so to talk more about this and more was max wolff senior analyst at green capital and professor at the new school he joined me earlier and started off by talking about the successes and failures on congress's part. i think i would liken it to the following congress took the u.s. government the u.s. economy hostage and they let their hostage go about an hour several hours after the hostage deadline and they now would like to be congratulated for letting their hostages go however since they took the hostages it's hard to be excited that addition to which this has reputational damage the united states as well as really damage the united states because all the uncertainty at all the negativity over the last really ten months almost as this dragged out and particular over the last six weeks have subdued the level of economic activity below where it would have been is

just a worst case scenario no is there anything here to congratulate on yourself really the way congress has not unless you live in the parallel universe that seems to house most of our senior political leadership so max let's talk about the winners and losers here who do you see as the what the biggest winners of last night and the biggest losers well certainly bigger winners and to earn some of our folks who make between two hundred fifty and four hundred or four hundred fifty thousand dollars as a family i'm not sure that's really the middle class although apparently congress which often earns in that range does think that's the middle class who are the losers here the united states is a loser among the community of nations because we showed our orgiastic dysfunction politically and showed how it affects our economy in a way that's very raw and could not possibly be beneficial in addition to which it is ironic that we watched the party especially the republican party fight tooth and nail to keep people from a four percent increase in their taxes if they make basically between two hundred fifty and four hundred fifty thousand dollars but nobody cared all that much to

keep the average household from seeing a one thousand dollar increase in their taxes viz a viz the payroll tax increase and i think it's a sort of painful reminder of who butters their bread and where congress is eyes are focused in terms of who they believe their core constituency is and that that's not even to mention the fact that the u.s. credit ratings will likely be downgraded yet again making it more difficult for the u.s. to borrow money as a government and also more access. so let me ask you this why did this bill fall so short i mean was congress so eager to pass a bill any bill at all but it forgot what it was trying to accomplish in the first place that's quite possible i mean i think you might be better off for the psychiatrist in an economist to figure this out what i would say is the following the difference between a democrat or republican parties here is actually not very big but they've been drinking their kool-aid exaggerating the sort of small difference between them into some giant difference which really is not fairly true the thing is that democrats really kind of promised there be no middle tax no middle class tax increase and

there'd be no entitlement cuts we're going to get middle tax middle income tax increases we're also going to get tied up in cuts and the republicans guaranteed to their faithful there'd be no tax increase but we got them so it was very difficult because there are very few things they promise their various bases democrats or republicans and this deal violated all the basic promises to both basic constituencies so nobody wanted to be responsible for a deal and everybody was much more interested in grandstanding and talking ideological purity than solving with nation's problems of course that's also how we got in to the difficult situation that we find ourselves in still now and certainly before the deal as well and i max we knew that some point there had to be a compromise and not everybody was going to be happy with every part of this bill that's something that we knew about but you just talked about the payroll tax cuts and the end of them and why no one is talking about the let me ask you this i mean you and i and the average americans are going to be paying more and that's just the fact of it seventy seven percent of us are going to be paying more so why was this

expected and why isn't congress or anyone for that matter talking about this is the the thing that is just on congress' part but it's a great question to give them the sort of benefit of the doubt here it was an expiry of a tax cut so what we're seeing is for a quarter rate going back to a six and a half or eight about on the payroll tax from the employers the employer employee as responsibility so it is actually the. the end of a tax cut as opposed to technically a tax hike although it will feel like one around eleven to thirteen hundred dollars for the average family why are we hearing much about it because they're focusing on the few successes some real some imagined and that is not an area of success and it highlights that when the republican party says no new taxes at all they mean new taxes including new taxes for people who can afford it and we're the democratic party says no new taxes for anyone making under two hundred fifty thousand they mean no new taxes except for the new taxes that you know which are thirteen hundred dollars more probably on average per year so nobody really wants to talk about the

face player that they executed here they want to talk about the past twist on their way down what they did not how they landed on their face not their feet and i do have to bring up another point there was a couple of interesting notes with this fiscal cliff deal there's a couple of sweet things that flit under the radar for most people things that you wouldn't expect to see there was four hundred thirty million dollars that was dedicated to hollywood to encourage television and film production three hundred thirty one million dollars went to railroads two hundred twenty two million dollars went to puerto rico and the virgin islands for taxes collected excise taxes collected on the they produced seventy million dollars went to nascar fifty nine million dollars went to algae growers to encourage the production of this sell you last sick bio fuel and four million dollars in expanded tax credits went to electric motorcycle makers so i mean all of those things from what i'm hearing they're all three nerves they're just meant to to encourage people that were really

against the fiscal cliff bill to be a little bit more open to it why these deals and why now was this really the most important thing that needed to be settled. but i think those are great examples and some of them quite funny others are sort of tragicomic but it reminds us we're talking about a four trillion dollars budget so the idea that there isn't really money for this or that is really another way of saying somewhat this on. your dog a priority on the payroll tax reminds us that the average working american suffering through and really the fifth year of stagnant to negative wage growth is not a priority if we want to look at why i think our debate would have to start on a political system that's auctioning off these jobs and we have to revisit things like citizens united and told we do that so bodies special constituent the needs of asparagus music or needs a bridge to nowhere or needs a special excise tax rebate is going to be first and foremost for congress on like working families because that's who pays for the care of a it's

a really interesting point to note and i know china and north korea are following this story a lot along with other well leaders are following this story quite closely they are actually asking the u.s. why is something not being resolved and you know there's a lot of other people that are wondering what kind of a precedent we're setting being a global leader for other countries to be able to resolve their issues max rodwell senior analyst for capital thank you so much for your opinions there thank you. still ahead here on our team while the new year brings hope for residents hit hard by hurricane sandy life is still pretty grim but that didn't stop congress from ignoring their needs and punting the sandy relief bill down the road that story when we return.

let me let me one will let me ask you a point. here on this network is what we're having the debate we have our night show. with you this is a little thing there again here it is or it will be i don't want you to talk about surveillance we.

welcome back well the fiscal cliff deal wasn't the only news coming out of capitol hill last night more than two months after one of the most destructive storms to ever hit the u.s. made landfall the house of representatives has yet to pass a sixty point four billion dollars hurricane sandy relief bill that the senate approved of last week the house chose not to vote on the bill again last night now

this afternoon a fiery new jersey governor chris christie took one shot after another house speaker john boehner and house republicans for their quote toxic internal politics . for the victims of sandy in new jersey new york and connecticut it's been sixty six days and the wait continues. there's only one group to blame for the continued suffering of these innocent victims the house majority and their speaker john boehner and you know what his right even though history has panned the federal government's reaction to the deadly hurricane katrina of two thousand and five then president george w. bush signed the first relief bill a mere four days after the storm made landfall compare that with the sixty six days since hurricane sandy hit the eastern shore board and well there's just a discrepancy now initial estimates of hurricane sandy say that at least fifty to

sixty billion dollars in damage was inflicted across the northeast after a meeting between the tri state area congress members and house leadership members said that the vote the house will vote on a nine billion dollars flood insurance program package on friday and the whole bill on january fifteenth so why is it taking so long for some answers i was joined by michael brooks producer of the majority port he joined me from new york which is of course at the center of the storm i started off by asking him what the holdup was. this is really hard to explain i mean maybe republicans just hate new york and new jersey in the tri state area but you know a little bit less flippantly i think one thing that happens is a lot of times we accuse republicans of. you know being hypocrites on fiscal policy which they often are so they will complain about out of control deficit and all the

rest and then they go and they splurge on tax cuts and corporate welfare and all the other sort of things they want to throw money at. and then you know i think what we're seeing here is another strain of republicanism which is sort of putting will or not putting its money where its mouth is which is there is a strain in the tea party and people like that who simply don't believe in federal relief no matter how serious the disaster and we're actually seeing this put into play it's a really extreme idea it's a really extreme policy and i think boehner is probably backing off because the fiscal deal has just gone through and his caucus is very upset and they don't want to spend any more money and particularly if it involves spending money on new yorkers and michael that's actually a really interesting point that you made obviously governor chris christie was very upset but he wasn't the only republican who was so fired up about the house of representatives decision not to vote on the bill last night peter king he's notoriously republican also notoriously outspoken was actually very vocal about

this issue as well and i want to play for you part of what he said about the matter . republican speaker walked off the floor without allowing a vote and i'm just saying these people have no problem finding new york these republicans and they're trying to raise money they raise millions of dollars in new york city and new jersey they think they're going to christie around the country raising millions of dollars for them i'm saying anyone from new york new jersey who contributes one penny to the republican gresham campaign committee which of the head examined i would not give one penny to these people based on what they did to us last night now michael representative king went as far as to insinuate that he will begin voting independently if a solution is not reached and assume so now we have these republicans that are attacking their own party i mean do you think that as you're kind of just mentioning the republican party is experiencing a fundamental shift. well that was some good long island talk from the

from peter king i don't know if it's a fundamental shift i think in peter king's case he's a savvy guy he knows his constituents and he knows who he's speaking to even when he's doing some really ugly things like his is muslim american baiting which is really been the main focus of his recent congressional career but he's got to be looking over his shoulder and saying look if my entire national party will do nothing they won't lift a finger to help my constituents who are in the middle of a slow motion at this point catastrophe how can i both i think he cares both ethically but also as a question of political survival making excuses for that he can't so michael let me ask you this do you think that this is a matter of people senator scott winners and they are in the tri state area versus the rest of the republican party or do you think that this is a line being drawn between traditional republicans and tea party members. who i think at this point it might even be a line between pretty conservative right wing republicans and tea partiers i mean

we're we're because you know there's a kind of other line of real moderate republican ism which is pretty much nonexistent now but there's also people who i think a lot of the kind of tribes the delegation would represent who are really still very conservative very right wing but they have a fundament the they have a certain rationality in their view of government and they know that billick this is never been held up before it's pretty extraordinary and obviously they also have to look out for their constituents too so i think it might be a dividing line between what's left of a more kind of rational republicanism and really extreme party ism and michael an interesting point to make is that governor chris christie he made a speech that disaster relief wasn't a political issue before but it clearly is now is this what the us is coming to everything big and little is divided down down party lines really. yeah i mean it's

pretty extraordinary there's never been a hold up on a disaster bill like this before i think that they're going to have to make some moves the kind of the mill you rate this i mean it's on the scale is smaller but a couple of years ago republicans held up a bill that would have provided. funding for first responders i think it was specifically firefighters around september eleventh that got held up until people like jon stewart and other people kind of made a big deal of it so. i i think it's symptomatic of a lot of other things and it's disturbing and disappointing i don't know how shocking it is to be honest but what we do know is that it has been in fact sixty six days since hurricane sandy hit and yet these people are still waiting governor christie went on to call them being treated like second class citizens so we'll just have to wait and see if something actually does come out friday and subsequently in january fifteenth michael brooks producer the majority are poor

thank you for your time they're ok thank you so much. even though you might be wearing winter jackets right now when cranking up the thermostat don't expect the heat to stay for too long why is that well continuing weather trends from two thousand and twelve this new year mother nature seems to have a resolution to become the hottest record of temperatures ever according to the united kingdom's met office which has recorded world temperatures since eight hundred fifty it was very likely that twenty thirteen will rocket to the top of the ten hottest years on record which here is currently on hold so record well globally speaking two thousand and ten is in the lead in cities like washington d.c. an album in new york saw there for monitors reach on preston temperatures this last year but that's it's not the heat that's the problem it's what the high temperatures cause the main issue is the kloet weirding of weather seen in

everything from record breaking droughts in the united states to freak weather events like hurricane sandy these weather phenomenons are actually expected to become more frequent in upcoming years record breaking temperatures have also have a huge effect on agriculture so expect food prices to become as high as the temperature itself now as with most global problems the impoverished are also the most vulnerable to these swings in temperature and all that comes with it let's use the horn of africa as an example data compiled by the department for international development suggests that between fifty and one hundred thousand people more than half of whom were children under the age of five died in two thousand and eleven because of the drought that affected somalia ethiopia and kenya and if this year is expected to be much worse temperature wise we can expect the consequences to be as disastrous or even more disastrous on

a global scale so will twenty thirteen also be the year that our govern. and explores these rising temperatures unfortunately the u.k. met office doesn't have any predictions about that. well congress might have been dragging its feet for the past couple of months when it came to solving the financial stability instability in this in this country but the pentagon sure hasn't been its problem the so-called pervasive vulnerability of drones when it comes to hackers according to the pentagon's for mayor science and technology division you avi's are prone to the same kind of hacks and hijacks as our own computers cars and medical devices only these machines are disease designed to kill people the problem comes down to control our algorithms the code writing is done in an unsafe and easily hackable manner and what's worse there's no way to check the vulnerabilities of these machines in these codes so where there is a will there is

a way though researchers are working to correct the problem with the new sixty million dollar program and earlier today i was joined by scott horton contributing editor at harper's magazine he spoke about the vulnerabilities of these machines and explained them from the beginning. no doubt about it you know the fact that they're unmanned is also the killie's heel of this program that is they're being operated from a far by the transmission of signals so of course if that signal stream can be can be replicated it can be interrupted the vehicle itself can be hijacked and we've seen a number of incidents of that i mean just this summer a group of students at the university of texas at austin demonstrated that they could hack their way into some drones right into the nose of some representatives of v.h.s. and it would go back over the last three or four years we see

a half dozen incidents in which hostile forces in iraq in afghanistan in iran have claimed to have been able to hack in to or intercept drones now the pentagon every term has insisted that that isn't the case but there have been drones that it veered off course and have landed at places where they shouldn't have landed which suggests that something went wrong and we do know this is an issue when it comes to coding the problem is that there's just no way to check the vulnerabilities in case together the software running on drawings so what is the way to fix it and is the sixty million dollars project really going to succeed at fixing all of the elements of this drone program. but there's no such thing as a permit and that actually here i mean what you're going to see is. is a constant need to update and upgrade security systems for the operation of these

programs and there's a risk of ported any point that just as program designers working for the department of defense in the united states develop new systems to protect or shield the communications and guidance systems. other groups. just as innovative bright young people in other countries will develop new systems to hack into and so it's a problem that's not going to go away and this is going to be an issue not just with the military grooms operator of the control the department of defense and the cia it's also going to be a problem with the new fleets of drones are being developed for domestic use within the united states by police forces for instance we're going to see the same problems with here and scott we've had and we've heard this compared to to your average everyday royal mail things medical devices computers and whatnot i mean safari in microsoft word on something have

a save them they are able to give you some type of virus software but as you just mentioned we're going to have to constantly update this software the problem is though that a drone or when you updated it means you have to really certify the entire project so talk about i mean obviously it's going to cost more than the sixty million dollars that they're talking about we're talking about taking each and every sale drone back to square one right. well i think it's you know you can't really view this is a one time sixty million dollars and the issue is over rather there's going to have to be a continual process of creating security and developing new security systems as the drones themselves develop and the problem here is the severity of the risk because this is a weapons system so that if these drones can be hacked not only can the information they're collecting be downloaded and intercepted now the most likely

targets will be the most likely people to do it would be the people who are the target so there's no great risk of them collecting that but the weapons systems can be turned around and used against us and i think that that's a much bigger problem. so let's talk about this this possible solution the sixty million dollars that's called the high assurance cyber military systems or h s c m s program and what it's saying it's going to do is it's trying to get a bunch of people together a bunch of cyber internet expressly able to help create a code that will in turn if i'm explaining this correctly create flawless codes of its own so it's a code system that writes other codes and am i right in this so far that's correct ok so then what is saying is not only are we going to have to start writing our own codes that are on hackable manageable and things like that but also what it's going to have to do is it's going to have to create this security control code so can we

just get into a little bit of the details here with all the steps that is going to take in order to have these drones be fully operational and do we have any kind of data and knowing when when the system will be in place when the only thing that was incorrect about you said before is the idea that there are on the back of all codes and systems there aren't there or you could introduce a new system and. there will be a you can imagine a clock ticking from the time you introduce the system until someone is able to hack and break into it so what's really required is constant turnover and constant change and you're always going to be just a few steps ahead of the actors. all right scott horton contributing editor at harper's magazine there's a lot of information and we appreciate you helping us break it down. and that's going to do it for now but for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash are to america where we post all of our interviews on line in full.