talk is cheap but not if you're an inmate at some american prison calling home could result in phone bills that are twenty four times as much as normal call rates . and just phone rates will dial in on the issue. get ready for a locked and loaded debate numerous teachers in ohio could be returning from their winter vacation with yet another certification under their belts but this one has nothing to do with a.b.c.'s or arithmetic the details of the armed teacher training program coming up. in the days and weeks after two of america's most monumental finance toilet financial institutions collapsed from terror attacks the men and

women who volunteered their time and health are being asked to prove they did in fact help out some call it offensive others a necessary procedure to distribute money for medical expense funds that story ahead. it's thursday january third four pm in washington d.c. i'm christine and you're watching our t.v. while yesterday president barack obama signed the twenty thirteen national defense authorization act despite threats he might veto the bill he then released a statement saying in part that he's approved the on your defense authorization legislation as he has done in previous years because it authorizes essential support for service members and their families or news vital national security programs and helps ensure that the united states will continue to have the strongest military in the world. now president the president went on to say he

signed the law because he supports the majority of the provisions but does not agree with all of them and the names of all of them he disagreed with like section five thirty three because the military already protects the freedom of conscience and others like section ten twenty seven and ten twenty eight because they limit the powers of the executive branch he didn't say anything about section ten twenty one one of the most controversial aspects of the n.d.a. the twenty version of the bill gave the military the power to arrest and hold people including americans without charge and without the writ of habeas corpus and california senator dianne feinstein had introduced an amendment in december that would have forbid an indefinite detention of americans and it did pass in the senate but it was later stripped from the final version of the bill now the executive director of the a.c.l.u. responded to all of this by saying this was a major fail on the part of the obama administration adding his signature means indefinite detention without charge or trial as well as illegal military

commissions will be extended he's also jeopardize his ability to close guantanamo bay during his presidency scores of men who have already been held for nearly eleven years without being charged with a crime including more than eighty who have been cleared for transfer may very well be imprisoned unfairly forget another year the president should use whatever discreation he has in the law to order many of the detainees transferred home and finally step up and close guantanamo bay and bring a definite end to indefinite detention now that end doesn't appear to be anytime soon this newly signed law could be an early sign that despite a fresh start you might be looking at more of the same from president obama's first term. let's live now to yet another example of the way the prison industry in this country continues to rake in the dough on the backs of taxpayers not to mention the incarcerated and their families for those who for whatever reason find themselves

behind bars phone calls home are virtually the only way to contact the outside world but those calls to family and friends are costing a pretty penny in state prisons i want to put this in a little perspective here a basic plan from say cricket wireless is four cents per minute for long distance or unlimited phone calls and texting for thirty five dollars a month now the federal prison system cost twenty three cents per minute but here's where it gets a little outrageous a call in georgia state prison via private company global tell link cost a dollar and thirteen cents a minute and about seventeen bucks for a fifteen minute phone call while it's the families that incur the cost the phone companies and the state prison systems are reaping in the profit even the federal prison system which charges much less still makes money off all the calls now the federal communications commission is taking notice of the exorbitant fees and after several years of putting the issue on the back burner they've agreed to look into the problem i want to talk now to peter ragnor executive director of the prison

policy initiative hey there peter thanks for being on the show i just want you to start by sort of breaking down the main issues for me here. so the problem is that there's three private telephone conference begins to control almost the entire market first phone calls home from prison and they negotiate exclusive contracts with state prison systems an exchange they can charge whatever they want now normally in a competitive bidding process the government might pick the organization that offers the cheapest price but here the states pick companies that provide the highest priced cars built into that price and the commission which is just a fancy word for a kickback a large portion of every phone call goes directly back to the states coffers today's individual states have an incentive to make sure that they hire a company that will charge as much as possible this is an interesting process and the f.c.c. has now released a proposed rule making more than a decade after this problem first came to light i mean is this world making

something that actually has ts well it can be we don't know yet what this what the f.c.c. has finally done is formally acknowledge that this is a problem and they formally acknowledged that they want to figure out what they can do and they started a process of public comment for sixty days and then ninety days replied comments so this is really the time when the public can say to the f.c.c. this is what we want you to do this is how we want you to do it and at the same time this is how the three private prison telephone companies which are backed by equity banks are going to come in and say no don't do this leave us alone it's really interesting is there a lot of people who would sort of look at this case peter and they would argue you know inmates too i says shouldn't be first priority here that the administrators of these prisons should get the final say what's their response to that. we're fortunately can't trust the administrators and prison systems to choose phone contracts that make any sense because they're financially benefiting from them so

they have a conflict of interest that the f.c.c. needs to protect poor families from because this is again it's not about what people in prison do it this is about charging unbelievable rates to the poorest families in this country who want to maintain family ties i think that's a really interesting point that you're making here because on one level this story is about money it's about competition in the free market it's about a possible monopoly but it's also about something a little more bigger picture what actually may be in the best interest of society to have these prisoners be able to make phone calls home and to do so in a way that's affordable because you know studies have shown increased contact with family members yield positive results especially you know in preventing some of these prisoners from returning to prison once they're released talk a little bit about some of these you know nonfinancial aspects of the argument one of the purposes of prison is to reduce crime but here we have because we have these

private companies conclude colluding with state governments to charge poor families high rates what happens when we have to choose between keeping their family together and paying their bills anything that the state does that breaks down family ties and makes people more likely to go back to prison increases the risk of crime and increases the risk to everyone in society regardless of their connections to the criminal justice system so how much the profit motive here is creating a really short sighted risk that hurts everyone so we can complain about some of the issues here some of the problems here but i want to talk about the process of finding a solution there are very few companies that run this type of business as you said i think there's a three major ones how can a market rate be set for the price of phone calls from prison. well normally the free market could intervene and people could pick which phone companies they want to use that's what you and i do on the outside we pick one our cell phone company is we pick our landline company but you can't do that in the prison context because

the state does the choice for you so there can't be regular free market competition so what we need to do instead is to establish a price cap incentive all contracts must be below a certain rate and in new york state for example when they bend the case back in the state is required to give the company the contract to the company that can offer the lowest rate the rates of the lowest in the ratio nation of five cents a minute the calls are monitored the calls are secure it's profitable for the company but the families are able to afford to maintain ties to their loved ones so new york and the federal system are really the model here and why do you think later it took so long to sort of have the f.c.c. get back to this problem and you know what's the likelihood that they'll actually get something done this time around i suspect the f.c.c. took a long time to do this because we're talking about a problem that disproportionately affects poor people and poor people do not have a lot of political clout in this country but the f.c.c. has finally responded to the political pressure and they've announced this

procedure where they're going to start to take comments and figure out exactly what the rules should be in what they're released at the end of december it's many pages of questions and things they wanted for mention on and that's what we need to be submitting to them in the next sixty days and working to respond to what the prison telephone industry says in response and certainly looks like at the very least the foundation has now been laid for a discussion about this issue and perhaps in the very near future that they'll move forward on this appreciate having you on the south peter ragnor executive director of the prison policy initiative thanks for having me. well it's been nearly three weeks since a mentally unstable twenty year old shot his way through the locked doors of sandy hook elementary school in newtown commit connecticut shooting twenty young children and six adults before taking his own life now since this incident there have been calls to change current policies regarding gun rights with many begging for stricter rules for those to be able to obtain guns even some of the n.r.a. is biggest supporters have said the time has come to revisit gun policy in america

now the national rifle association had a different take summed up basically by this the only way to stop a monster from killing our kids is to be personally invested in plano absolute protection the only thing this. guy with a gun is saying guy with a gun. well a new program seeks to follow this idea it's called the armed it teacher training program a free firearms training program for teachers and school administrative staff put on by the buckeye firearms foundation in the state of ohio so far six hundred people have signed up from states including ohio but also arizona california florida illinois west virginia and new jersey it also is not just futures it is traders principal superintendents you know office staff guidance counselors. that

for food service people transfer to should people the pilot training program would include a cross-section of those who already have a concealed carry permit to those who have little to no experience with guns it will be extensive and tailored to help school officials prepare for school violence like what took place in connecticut. so i want to talk more about this idea with jim hansen a military blogger with black five dot net jim going to say on the show i just want first get your take i mean what do you think about this idea of arming teachers and also about the fact that so many people have signed up for it first of all amidst a cornucopia of really bad ideas to try and solve this horrendous problem i think this is actually a good one i mean not all teachers are in any way going to be suited for this but the ones who are i think given the choice between unarmed victims and armed people who may as well in here said be able to actually stop a shooting like this why not and we you know we should mention this is

a voluntary program but when you look at the facts and you look especially at history i mean arming people isn't necessarily a disincentive for shooters and might actually put passers by in more danger we saw of course what happened with the times square shooting back in august in new york city and nine people injured because you know the police got involved and they had their guns and you know accidentally shot people who they thought may or may not have been suspects we had you know the fort hood shooting this took place on a military base where there's plenty of weapons and that didn't stop so many victims none of those people of fort hood had their weapons with them because they were essentially disarmed by the u.s. military the problem is if you look at three of the four last mass shootings they occurred in gun free zones no you know we think about the victims they were definitely gun free they were bullets filled there was no women are criminals don't follow laws crazy people don't follow laws so the idea that you can put a sign on the wall this is gun free zone what you've done is create security

theater you've done absolutely nothing as far as making people safe so the idea that disarming victims and creating pools of people who can't defend themselves is a good idea isn't a good idea what about though the notion i mean that this would change the face of the society that we live in i think we have to think about you know where. what kind of future we want for our children do we want them to attend schools with armed teachers that you know what happened in newtown certainly was tragic it was devastating and disgusting but but is this the kind of country that we want to live in that has armed teachers in our schools if i have to choose between armed teachers or dead school children i'll take on teachers every single time it may not solve the problem it's definitely not a panacea there are plenty of other issues related to this mental health probably being a more prevalent problem but if you're going to say that having an armed teacher is somehow putting the children at risk we already trust them with our children's lives why not given the opportunity to protect them if that were in the situation

occur i think you have to look at what you know having armed teachers with bring on i mean i think it would bring on the fact that many of these teachers could be slightly mentally unstable and after a rough day with the first grade class could go reach for the gun you know how do we prevent that is that going to involve you know boat loads more paperwork and things that you know for a teacher or a chemistry teacher obviously is small enough to make cyanide and could lock the door and kill all the kids if you wanted to anyhow so i don't think the idea that guns are the issue creates a bigger problem the problem is if you create gun free zones if you create places where you disarm the law abiding citizens and innocent victims without offering anyone a chance to stop it look at virginia tech how long did that guy around the campus shooting people because nobody had a gun. so i mean i guess what do you think i mean do you think not only elementary schools but colleges and everywhere i mean is there anywhere that that you know

people there shouldn't have guns bars drunk people probably shouldn't have guns but i think law abiding people should give the last time i read it the second amendment says the right to keep and bear arms that doesn't mean in a locked cabinet at home or it doesn't do any good downtown d.c. where we're sitting right now is one of most dangerous places on earth and yet i don't have a right to carry a weapon around here because the d.c. city council doesn't trust me with a gun me with a gun is a safe boo for the rest of society there are other people like me and if they're trained if their background checked and authorized to carry weapons they make the world a safer and better place and for the most part i mean i would think that you know a lot of people do have the best intentions in mind but it only takes you know one person as we saw in the case of newtown. you know to make these bad decisions i mean is there a way to even begin to regulate this there is no way to make perfection we expect perfection in this society and we think you can take any problem and remove all the

risk and make the world perfect can't do it so you do the art of the possible the art of the possible says if you disarm people you create a pool of victims if you allow people who've been properly vetted to go ahead and exercise the right we all have the constitution you at least have a chance to defend yourself i want to go back to something you were talking about as far as washington d.c. you said it's one of the most dangerous place that has one strict strictest gun laws in the nation at work i just ended the year with the lowest crime rate since one nine hundred sixty one so it is in fact not the most dangerous just because it had five hundred thirty two gun homicides this year and yet they have completely restrictive gun laws in chicago you can make laws you can't make criminals and crazy people follow so i mean the idea that you can regulate this away is a farce just last question for you jim i mean what. we saw three weeks ago with newtown we saw a december that saw some of the highest gun sales in history we saw you know more people buying guns than ever and then this program the arms teachers program we saw

at least so far six hundred people signed up why do you think that is people assume that brack obama the liberals in congress are going to do what they promised which is make some extremely dumb rules which have absolutely no effect on people's actual safety so try to get ahead of the power curve by going now because you may not be able to get one later right always interesting to talk to you i think it's important to get all these perspectives out there jim hansen a military blogger black five time at. well when we hear the term burden of proof we usually associate it with prosecutors trying to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that someone is guilty of a crime most of us wouldn't think about this term in relation to nine eleven first responders we know of we know who is guilty and what occurred on september eleventh we have seen the faces of the al qaeda members responsible for claiming the lives of some three thousand men women and children but it turns out that the volunteers who surrendered their time and health to help a city in need are now being asked to do something they've never been asked before

in order to access financial help with their medical bills as part of a funding stablished in congress in two thousand and ten volunteers must now prove they actually were on the scene helping out the document according to the law must be quote witnessed or sworn but in the resulting chaos of the tragedy and cleanup it's not an easy task to talk more about all of this i'm joined now by jamie hazen ground zero volunteer hey there jamie thanks for being on the show i know you were a volunteer first responder at ground zero what drew you to volunteer and what kind of work did you do yes christine thank you so much for covering this is such an incredibly important topic and it means an enormous amount of thousands of people that descended upon ground zero in new york so i was a former new york state e.m.t. i was certified for six years so i wasn't actually certified at the time of the attacks but there were only so many people in new york state on manhattan island at that time so you did what anyone else would have done you went down to help out

your city so that's what i did i volunteered initially on day one at chelsea piers doing triage work and then i headed downtown the next day to volunteer at ground zero doing rescue and recovery work obviously jamie no way to know that when you did that when you kind of stepped up and to step in that you were you know no way to know that you were a risk for you know illness talk to me about your story what kind of illnesses you can contract and you know how did you know for sure that they're actually a result of you volunteering at ground zero. well the truth is at first i really didn't know christina had no clue why i couldn't breathe happened you know a lot of the physical the psychological symptoms they sit in fairly quickly and i suffer from p.t.s.d. today and since the very first day it occurred. physical symptoms there is sort of an onset in the latency in the process of how it goes so many many years ago i couldn't breathe i was just sitting at my desk not understanding why i couldn't breathe when from my doctor to the next doctor who referred me to the next doctor

and they didn't know it was going on and finally it was a cardiologist who looked at me and she said you know you're presenting very similar to how people at ground zero present who are a member of f.d.a. and why and agencies that are not phones here agencies who are being checked more regularly when you go up to mt sinai hospital they have a treatment program and see if they can confirm or deny what's going on and then unfortunately they confirmed my breathing issues which i have gerd which is gastroesophageal reflux disease. and a host of other elements related to being down there was as a result of being exposed to toxins and you know and as you've been speaking to me we've been showing some video from a protest that i attended a couple years ago this is nine eleven first responders that came in you know first responders who. as you said new york police department people from jersey people from all over who came in to respond it was their job and we're showing this video right now many of them on you know with extreme asthma with oxygen tanks and will

be for the rest of their lives now for those who don't remember eventually the first responders bill passed but it took a long time and a whole lot of fighting and congress first choosing not to vote in favor of this before they actually you know went ahead and gave the green light to give some of these people the compazine compensation they deserved why do you think it is taking so long and took so long and has taken such a big fight get to. these people and people like yourself what they deserve who christine you're completely correct it is taking and has taken way way too long and i can just tell you on a personal note i feel very cast aside so much time has been put into i'm having to fight and fight and fight to be taken care of but the good news is that it was past the bad news is that it's taking forever it was a christmas miracle of two thousand and ten happy new year two thousand and thirteen now so so we're really looking at so what have you been told over the last

three years i mean talk to me about this process of getting compensate compensation for medical care well well right now for me it isn't a process of getting compensation for medical care because i already am a part of the mt sinai world trade center medical treatment program so i get my care of at mt sinai hospital who actually was up there today for an m.r.i. and i'm there frequently to get care and they're wonderful and what did you find out today well today i'm i got an m.r.i. because i'm trying to find if they're going to go ahead with sinus surgery so far i've had stomach surgery they might have to do sinus surgery they might have to do some modifying to my stomach surgery they're talking about doing some new surgery to my lungs to make it easier for me to breathe there's a there's a lot going on that's there but back to your question which is very important and critical and that is we have the and the b.c.s. has got to determine who has a legitimate case and who does not and they unfortunately have to figure this out

somehow it stinks having to wait i'm really not happy about it feels like it's taking forever but at the end of the day the government shouldn't just hand out money to anyone who puts their hand out i fully believe that's what i was going to say i mean this is very hard to decipher because sad to say but there really are people out there who will and have tried to take advantage of the system right but i think that those are very few and far between compared to the people that need help there are thousands of responders who. are volunteers volunteer in status meaning they didn't work for the new york police department they did not work for f.t. and why they went down there just because it was the right thing to do and they deserved to be taken care of now and they deserve to be cared for and an expeditious kind of a way and there's got to be a quicker way to go about doing this because it seems to be taking a long time but again every time i make a comment like that i stop myself and i say wait a second jamie what if i were a special master of burma and i had to sit there and figure out how do i run this

this fund properly and fairly and i think that it isn't it isn't fair to ask them to do to not do diligence they have to do diligence the question is how fast can you do that diligence to be able to get the relief that the first responder volunteers need and that is the big question right now and i think it could be a little bit faster than again not behind the scenes i don't know it's going on but something's got to be done again it's two thousand and thirteen the bill passed at the end of two thousand and ten people need the help they have the proof i'm one of the lucky ones i actually have a picture of me if i could just very quickly share with you when i was down at ground zero i accidentally ran into a paramedic who trained me when i was eighteen years old to be an e.m.t. and you know i was there when i was thirty years old ten years back not to date myself but when it came time to need proof i was thinking great i'm just going to go give him a call and that would be how i'd find proof for unfortunately. captain mcdonough

passed away so i didn't have any proof of him i met his boss down there briefly while i was there again these are new people working so i went and introduced myself to his boss he dug through his desk and this is ray florida who heads rockland paramedic services and ray found a picture with me clipped in the corner and now i got lucky because of that but the chances of that happening are truly a miracle for me i think. they really are good always there was not a time where people were taking pictures for the most part or i can see how it could be very hard to come by this evidence unfortunately we're out of time but it really interesting story i know you and so many others have been writing i think you so much for giving light to this story it's so important what you're doing and i really have to applaud the press for putting the health of the first responder first great job thanks so much ground zero volunteer jamie hazen joining us in our new york studio. and the phrase if you don't have anything nice to say about

someone don't normally extent in journalism except in the case of glenn beck back is of course a former a fox news host who most recently made headlines for trying to sell a jar filled with his urine and a toy of brock obama for twenty five thousand dollars clearly he enjoys controversy and he's at it again this time he banned his employees at his news and entertainment network the blaze from mentioning the president by name because back he is sick and tired of hearing about barack obama here he is talking about not talking about the president on wednesday's radio show. you can play joe biden but i can't take the man's voice i don't want to hear him i don't want to know about him . you want that information go anyplace else there's thousands of outlets now you can have all that information you want i'm not talking about that man anymore well as going to talk to report many political stories without mentioning the name of the person at the center of them while back maybe the first boss to publicly state

that his employees can't say the president's name he's not the only one using political intimidation on those who work for him we of course saw this during the election season but glenn beck as we know just likes to be in the center of controversy that is going to do it for us for now we will be back here at five o'clock. wealthy british style. markets why not it's a scandal find out what's really happening to the global economy with max cause or for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune into cons a report on. something. law

is beneath. thousands of meters of ice and rock. that is alluring for many. but dangerous even to those who keep it at a distance. us .