what's up guys i'm out here martin and this is breaking this what seems at the story about the murder of a british soldier on a busy london street just keeps getting weirder and weirder see over the weekend to solve a childhood friend of the murder suspect gave an exclusive interview to b.b.c.'s newsnight and it he gave some startling revelations in sabah claims that the british intelligence agency m i five tried to recruit michael. the guy in the video with the blood in his hand six months ago adding that he had been subject to harassment by the agency but that's not all and sob also claims that his friend was tortured and sexually assaulted while the taint in kenya perhaps under the supervision of the u.k. government which he attributes to a bit of abbaye de la joe's radicalization and in a final bizarre twist was arrested at the b.b.c.

on suspicion of terrorism immediately following the interview look there's a lot of things that remain unclear however if you saw those allegations are indeed true and this event should call into question the counterterrorism methods being used by the british government like was this a terrorism sting gone wrong as m i five responsible for radicalizing this man as far as the tactics go our government agents creating more terrorists than there thwarting these are the questions that we should be asking until they're answered i'll be breaking the set. let's look at where you've never seen anything like it. one of the most controversial policies of the obama administration has been there as a collision of drone warfare there's been a lot of conflicting reports on the upside of drone news with john brennan even

having claimed the ones that they cause no civilian casualties however that couldn't be farther from the truth recent reports show that there are four thousand seven hundred deaths associated with these so-called targeted killings and of course that number continues to grow by the day it's an issue that the listening outcry from thousands of people across the world leading president obama to sign a policy just last week hoping to quell the dissent by providing guidelines for oversight and accountability of drones going forward the fact sheet released to the public outlines a number of preconditions for using lethal force including that the threat be imminent and capture not feasible but interestingly enough all of these preconditions would be excused under quote extraordinary circumstances without any clear definition of what that might entail so to talk about this new policy obama's orwellian speech and what it all means for constitutional rights i spoke earlier with marjorie cohn professor of human rights at thomas jefferson school of law and

author of a forthcoming book on drones and targeted killings i first asked her what the main problems are with this new checklist of preconditions for drones and here's what she had to say. one of the preconditions is that it says that the. target of the targeted killing of the drone strike for example has to be planning an imminent attack on u.s. persons and interests and yet they don't define imminent and in a white paper that was released recently that had to do with. the. targeted killing of u.s. citizens it defined imminence in such a way that there didn't have to really be any impending attacks civic attack against a u.s. person or interest so that imminence it's not really clear what imminent means and

another thing is that there be obama administration has not just been targeting specific individuals but rather they've been conducting these think signature strikes where if there's an area of suspicious activity and there's anyone found in that area they will be dropping bombs on the area without even knowing who they're dropping bombs on and yet obama's guidelines don't say anything about ending these signature strikes and also the that kind of asterisk at the bottom saying you know in extraordinary circumstances all of this can be known void so it really does call into question what extraordinary circumstances would allow you to kind of overlook all those things but even taking this into account professor is this too little too late i mean we're talking about five years after kind of doing all these things why now. well there has been

a lot of criticism especially from the left. and also from people in other countries particularly people in pakistan and other countries where we are fighting terrorism that kid the killing of civilians the very large number of civilians that have been killed with these drone attacks with these targeted killings. is unacceptable and actually has blowback against the united states and makes people in these other countries hate us more not less and so for example in pakistan which has a lot of nuclear weapons when obama did a targeted killing of osama bin laden when he certainly could have captured him when they the u.s. military soldiers got to the compound to obama's that osama bin laden's compound base saw that they could have actually nobody was armed and so they could have

captured him but yet they took him out and they did this without telling the pakistani government and obama said in his speech last week that in fact this caused a lot of tension between the united states and pakistan and and that's the kind of thing that happens when these drone strikes kill people especially in large numbers of civilians also the drone strikes don't just kill the target or whoever happens to be in the sights but then when people come to rescue the wounded then these drone strikes kill them as well and when they have funerals to bury the people who have been killed in the drone strikes then more drones come and kill the people at the funerals so this creates tremendous animosity against the united states and when high level generals were telling obama that this is actually having the opposite effect on these so-called. war on terror i think that he realized and he's

probably realized for a long time that he wants to at least give the appearance because we'll see whether his actions match his words of narrowing the number of people who are actually going to be killed by these drone strikes why do you think it is that obama hasn't been opting to capture suspects instead of just killing them. well that creates its own set of problems such as bringing more people to guantanamo when he supposedly wants to close guantanamo indefinitely detaining them dealing with their hades corpus petitions dealing with for example hunger strikes over half of them are on a hunger strike right now reacting to the hunger strikes by force feeding them it's much more complicated to to arrest them and and detain them then it is just to take them out and since this program has been shrouded in such secrecy he has been able to really get away with this and has only recently and this was i think the

day before his speech and made it to the killing of four americans including i'm sure our locky and his sixteen year old son and two other people although he also admitted that the only one of these four american citizens who was actually a target was our locky which means that the other three were so-called collateral damage that makes the reality for seventy five percent collateral damage i want to play a really quick clip of what he said about that during that foreign policy speech. given my administration's relentless pursuit of al qaeda leadership there is no justification beyond politics for congress to prevent us from closing a facility that it should should have never been opened you know obama loves to blame congress for not allowing him to close gitmo but professor cohen i mean really if you want to close it today you could by using that national security waiver why hasn't he done this. that's a very good question he's been very timid and in fact he complains that congress

took away his authority to close guantanamo to transfer detainee's out of guantanamo and the national defense authorization act which he himself signed he shouldn't have signed it if he didn't agree with it and yet he went ahead and signed it he could have actually forced congress' hand there and been able to transfer a lot more of these detainees and you're right even in that authorization act there is a waiver provision where if he determines or his use a defense secretary determines that it's in the national security interest of the united states they can on a case by case basis decide to release people also he himself imposed a halt on transferring detainees who had been already cleared for release to yemen and he is now with did that that that moratorium on transfers to yemen which is a good thing that he did in his speech you know another thing that he talked about

the speech was the a u.m.s. the authorization for use of military force of course signed a muslim man immensely after nine eleven and by everyone and he's expanded that vastly i mean we're now in so many other countries it calls us how he doesn't want to be a boundless war on terror but professor i mean hasn't already expanded the far beyond bush and do you think this is ever something that we'll see repealed because really this seems to be continuous. well he has actually gone beyond the limits of the the a u.f.o. authorization for use of military force that congress passed shortly after september eleventh two thousand and one only gives the president the authority to use military force against people and groups who actually participated and helped plan the nine eleven attacks and yet obama has used it much more broadly going after people all over the world and so by him saying he wants congress to rein him in by repealing or revising this seems

a bit disingenuous since he's already been violating it as it is and you talked about the three principles of course in your latest article for truth are the three principles of international law that govern the use of military force is this what you're speaking of how his kind of get gone beyond this and how the current war and her strategy violates these principles going to outline what those are really quickly. yes the first is called proportionality and proportionality under the geneva conventions requires that an attack not be excessive in terms of the military advantage that it that it seeks and when you talk about as he's been violating that one by killing large numbers of civilians and the rescuers and the people at the funerals the second principle is a principle of last resort and that means that military force can only be used as a last resort when all peaceful means peaceful alternatives have been exhausted and yet given the fact that even without a lockie it's if it was clear from

a higher level people that he quit it captured a lockie instead of killing him the same with osama bin laden the same with a lot of these people that would have been a non-lethal alternative and yet he didn't pursue that he just went straight to the use of lethal force so that violated the principle of last resort and the third principle is the principle of self-defense and that principle is defined by the very well established caroline case which says that before using military force the threat to us has to be so imminent that the there is no chance to to even wait or deliberate it has to be and has to be immediate and in fact he's violated this as well because there has been no evidence that these strikes that he has been drone strikes and other kinds of targeted killing that he's carried out against people all over the world of have been in response to their doing imminent danger being in an imminent danger to the united states where there were none of those ply

i mean as a result i'm clearly one of them applied we have about thirty seconds left but i just want to ask you as one constitutional law professor to the other what do you think about obama's approach to the rule of law. well obama's approach to the rule of law you can see because he has refused to brain the torture team from the bush administration the officials and the lawyers from dead that set the torture policy that's well established refused to bring them to justice as is required by the constitution the president has do you enforce the law and yet he has refused to bring them to justice implicitly validating what they did and so he has only abided by the rule of law when he wants to and not when he should well thank you so much for your insight professor marjorie cohen professor of human rights at thomas jefferson law school and author of a forthcoming book on drones i am part of killings want to watch out for that.

we're taking a quick break but when we come back we'll take a closer look at how the pentagon chose to honor our soldiers a memorial day. they all told me my language as well but i will only react to situations as i have read the reports and let you know please let me know i will leave them to the state department to comment on your latter point of the month to say it is the security of a car is on the docket. no more weasel words

when you need a direct question be prepared for a change when you have to punch be ready for a battle freedom of speech and down to freedom to cost. sure. will. that speech. will. be misleading good.

amount of money that really. lists. yesterday was memorial day one day the year where america's fallen servicemen and women are honored for their alternate sacrifice for many veterans their final resting place is right here in washington d.c. at arlington national cemetery where president obama just gave a morial day address. most americans are not directly touched by war. as a consequence not all americans may always see or fully grasp.

the depths. of sacrifice. the profound the calls that are made in our name. right now. as we speak. every day yes mr obama americans aren't directly touched by war and fact this country is pretty well shielded from that reality which is why memorial day is so important if not to remind the american people about the horrors of war and to at least remember the promises this government makes to its veterans and their families interestingly the state of the economy has not been a strong enough reason to end all wars of aggression it has been the justification for a series of devastating budget cuts that will largely be felt by military families that's right many of the programs designated to take care of the families of soldiers killed in combat are taking a huge hit as a result of the sequester resources allocated for survivors pension benefits and

disability compensation will be slashed along with cuts to the already meager payouts for spouses and children of fallen soldiers under the dependency and indemnity compensation program so what options will these families have once the promised funds are exhausted while military families will become more dependent on social safety nets like food stamps and social security but oh wait too bad all those are getting flash too because heaven forbid we cut the pentagon's budget right you know the war machine that's responsible for creating thousands of new veterans every year to walk the priorities of this country are looking at a crossroads right now one that requires us to drastically rethink our policies what's more important helping families who are suffering or purchasing entire fleet of f. thirty five fighter jets a price tag set to reach a total of one point five trillion dollars according to foreign policy magazine and

the most infuriating part is that the government chooses to spend more money on the military even the most obvious of circumstances when they don't have to the project . governmental oversight reported this year that the military contractors cost on average two point nine times more than an average pentagon civilian and lawyer form in the same job i'm not even talking about military contractors abroad i'm talking about civilian workers almost eight hundred thousand of which are receiving furloughs one not a single pentagon contractors feeling the pain so while we continue to hear baseless and empty rhetoric about veterans and supporting the troops just remember these chickenhawk politicians will never experience war does this continue to throw millions of poor people at home and abroad into a meat grinder all to advance us imperialism so this issue goes beyond just

caring for veterans it's about not creating any more of them. today in federal court internet activist jeremy hammond pleaded guilty to one violation of the computer fraud and abuse act ham is a twenty seven year old political hacktivist who was arrested last year for publicizing internet e-mails from the private intelligence firms for stratfor e-mails revealed an incredible amount of information such as the company's wide range of spying activities including surveillance on everything from animal rights activists to occupy wall street protesters all at the request of the department of homeland security and the state and released today hammond defended his actions saying quote i did this because i believe people have a right to know what governments and corporations are doing behind closed doors i did what i believe is right unfortunately in germany doing what's right wasn't

enough to spare him the conviction and time in prison he's already served fifteen months many weeks of which have been in solitary confinement and now he's facing a maximum sentence of ten years so here to break down this case and what it signifies for the freedom of information and joined now by abi housen mass defense corps nater for the national lawyers guild thanks so much for taking the time but i thank you for having me so let's start with this plea deal why did jeremy take the plea. well you know he's been as you said he's been incarcerated for about fifteen months now and he's been held without bail he's been denied visits from his family he's been denied any type of visitation from friends and he took a deal because i think he was facing forty two years he is isolated he is in a very vulnerable situation and he basically waited waited out and said you know taking ten years now and having some certainty or up to ten years now and having

some certainty is better than the risk of the rest of his life in prison. and shockingly a really interesting twist in this story is that an f.b.i. informant was used jeremy to get to wiki leaks was in on the whole thing can you elaborate on what actually happened here well we don't know all of what happened because you know we don't have all the information out from the f.b.i. and what their their operation was but basically someone someone much like jeremy. not much like jerry said in the same situation is jeremy his name is hector his online name was who was put in a similar situation to jeremy and what he did instead was along with it rather than take a plea deal or you know remain silent he he made a deal with the f.b.i. and basically started an online crime spree he kind of orchestrated it and was a ringleader of this group called and along with the f.b.i. went around committing various crimes and hacking various sites and even keeping

stuff on f.b.i. computers and he did that all to get out of facing what space so if the f.b.i. was overseeing the operation through and through this operation i mean are they just set an example of jeremy because really it was a sting all along and they knew his activities all along and it was a sting gone wrong. well i mean you know they i don't know if there was a sting gone wrong because you know they entrapped a bunch of people they got a bunch of they got it they got a few convictions most of germany's co-defendants are in the u.k. they've actually been sentenced to the same amount of time as jeremy has spent pretrial so that says something about you know the equities between the u.s. and other countries especially under the c.f.a. . but yeah i mean i don't know if i want to i don't know what the f.b.i. is the motivation was but they definitely are trying to make an example of

a lot of people using the c.f.a. because it's such a broad law it's such a big law that they can basically you know conservative law professor or incur said that they could basically put any internet user in jail if they want to do so what they're doing is they are making example of certain people who who are you know actively political or you know who have gained notoriety you know aaron swartz being a famous example of someone who was you know an active political person and was a high profile and he was again facing similar not quite as much time as jeremy but facing basically decades in prison for his activism so i guess i was saying that because you know stratford leak on wiki leaks was so embarrassing to so many people within the government and the surveyance community i was wondering maybe they didn't know that would go that far or what not so i guess we won't know until more information comes out but as you said i mean i'll be six other activists were involved in the hacking three of them in britain serving twenty four to thirty two months one more is free on

a suspended sentence where's the disconnect here between the u.s. and britain and ireland. well i mean it's actually you know the alleged members of the people who were indicted was about six people but there's a there's hundreds probably of people who were probably members of the. you know dozens of countries it's the us that has really gone after them and you know that's why we're that's why we were. doing so much activism around jeremy that's why his brothers put out a change dot org petition and we're trying to push for lenience because it is it is completely on just and it's completely crazy that this young man who's twenty eight years old would be facing ten years in jail for a completely nonviolent crime that was you know the government likes to portray it as something that it was done that he was stealing credit cards but there's no indication that that he did it for personal gain whatsoever you know they're also elements of the strap for his covering up just completely negligent security basically the they have the d.o.j. doing. security force for half or because they can't put

a password on their database but you know it is the disparities are absurd and now you know he is facing ten years and we are trying to you know regardless even even with the disparities there the judges watch t.v. the judges read the newspaper the prosecutors you know those circles will hopefully be able to see some of this exposure of this and to have some we see and we encourage everyone out there to get on the petition at change or because it's really that's where the hope is right now is there anything else that people can do to try to reduce jeremy's sentence other than signing a petition on change dot org. well i mean right now that's that's the best thing is you know if people have specific things they want to do they can contact us at free jeremy dot net we have a web site that has a lot of information about the case and about him and about the history here and people can contact us if they have ideas or other types of activism or but right now the change or get you know the more people we can get on that the better. and

yeah i mean it's you know i think aaron swartz was someone that. brought a lot of attention to the c.f.a. law and there's his organization demand progress is pushing reform and i think that the you know reform maybe might not be enough but you know looking at these laws and especially this week with the with the d.o.j. revelations of their just rampant abuse of the media this is the same thing this is this is using the harshness of one of you know one of the toughest certainly the systems in the world to suppress information and to suppress people who are releasing information and you know unfortunately it does signal and everybody's talking about it's a very. good time thank you so much for coming on breaking down the case of all the more than mass defense corner for the national lawyers guild appreciate it thank you. well that's it for that show you guys have a great night and i'll see you right back here tomorrow.

she good lumber a jury. was able to build the world's most sophisticated robot which on fortunately doesn't give a dollar amount anything mission to teach me the creation and why it should care about humans. this is why you should. only. played an assembly jazz band together. hijacked a plane to get. them from music to tara. twenty five questions still remain. just bad hi jack.

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