coming up on r t after nine eleven the white house gain more power in the war against terror now lawmakers are considering ways to limit these increases and presidential power public clarifying certain rules really make a difference for just ahead. on signs point to the obama administration nominating it x. bush official to be the new f.b.i. director james comey is facing criticism for signing off on secret wiretapping while he was deputy attorney general will dive into his resume a look at some of his past decisions. a ratings freefall the left leaning network m.s.m. b.c. is facing a rating slump the news network had dropped a fourth place in prime time we'll explore what may be causing to decline later on the show.

it's friday may thirty first five pm in washington d.c. i'm margaret how well you're watching r t. starting off this hour the. lawmakers are looking to make a few changes to the authorization of the use of military force joint resolution currently under the national defense authorization act the contains they claim which they give the executive branch brought to forty to go after threats to our national security interest in light of september eleventh well now congress along with the president are trying to clarify the process for targeting these threats are his political commentator sam sachs brings us more on the a.u. a math and how we currently manage the war on terror. when we think about our wars since two thousand and one we usually think of just these two countries afghanistan and iraq but those were the signature wars our so-called war on terror stretches

beyond those borders if we include nations that we've launched drone strikes into for example it looks like this in pakistan yemen somalia we have also launched trikes in libya but really even this map doesn't show how limitless the so-called war on terror has now become. here's why very early on in the obama administration in march of two thousand and nine the definition of the authorization for use of military force the a un method which basically authorized the war in afghanistan in two thousand and one against al qaeda was expanded to include not just al qaida but also associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the united states or its coalition partners including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported hostilities in aid of such enemy armed forces now this is important because the pentagon and department of justice have justified everything from drone strikes to indefinite detention under this expanded

a u.m.s. definition in fact the d.o.j. white paper released earlier this year on targeted killings specifically says quote the president has authority to respond to the imminent threat posed posed by out. and it's associated forces arising from his constitutional responsibility to protect the country the inherent right of the united states national self-defense under international law. but what exactly is an associated force of al qaeda that we are at war with but we have some idea this is a two thousand and four list of associated forces identified by the department of defense this information was found in the guantanamo files made public by wiki leaks as you can see it's a rather large list and includes organizations you probably didn't know we were at war with over the last decade including the iranian intelligence agency pakistani intelligence the muslim brotherhood is blow up and hamas plus more than sixty other groups now here's the thing if we include the organizations that are listed as

associated forces by the pentagon here then really the global war on terror looks a lot more like this including nations like algeria lebanon morocco egypt respect as in tajikistan iran tunisia saudi arabia syria and really the list just goes on and on so this war is far more expansive than most of us can even imagine and some in congress now want to rein it in the hill reports today that early draft language in the new national defense authorization act would quote require president obama and the pentagon to review all groups or individuals now characterized as associated forces under the current rules the root review mandated by the draft language would require the pentagon to specifically lay out whether those groups or individuals are directly tied to al qaeda operations and if they are engaged with ongoing or future terror plots against the united states or its allies so if

congress succeeds in this this will be the first limit imposed on the math in more than a decade and as this conflict has now expanded into more regions of the world that we never imagined we'd be dropping bombs on. the new limits on this global war on terror is exactly what's needed most in washington same sex party it looks as though president obama will nominate an ex bush administration official for the f.b.i.'s top spot replacing robert mueller comber was a former senior justice department official serving under attorney general john ashcroft many loud comber as a good public servant under bush he doesn't come to the table without controversy privacy advocates question his ability to protect civil liberties considering recent allegations about the good obama administration's policies regarding wiretapping and surveillance while serving as deputy attorney general comey was approved the n.s.a. warrantless wiretapping policy so what can we expect from an f.b.i.

with comey at its helpful artie's list wall looks into it. it looks like president obama will nominate james comey to lead the f.b.i. has a resume that has garnered both praise and controversy between two thousand and three and two thousand and five komi you served as deputy attorney general in the bush administration in two thousand and four comey took over for his boss attorney general john ashcroft when he became sick despite pressure from the bush administration comey refused to reauthorize the n.s.a.'s warrantless wiretapping program at a senate hearing in two thousand and seven komi described how senior administration officials came to ashcroft's hospital bed to try to get his approval for the spying program as he laid back down he said but that doesn't matter because i'm not the attorney general there is the attorney general and he pointed to me and i was just to his left the two men did not acknowledge me they turned and walked from the room

he goes on to describe standing up to high ranking members of the bush administration for this call me has received praise from both republicans and democrats but civil rights advocates point to other dark spots on companies record b. a.c.l.u. says quote as the second highest ranked justice department official under john ashcroft call me approved some of the worst abuses committed by the bush administration just when we need a real break with the past we get another nominee from the bush just like we had john brennan from the bush era who was high up in the cia when torture and indefinite and she was being used and now he's confirmed as obama's head of the cia as deputy attorney general tommy would have approved controversial programs including enhanced interrogation techniques like waterboarding and the indefinite detention program i think with comi although he enjoyed this almost cinematic hero

status because of the showdown with ashcroft over one thing we can't forget that he was in church. a lot of been hints to techniques also known as torture komi is expected nomination come shortly after president obama's speech about drone policy and closing guantanamo bay obama pledge this speech was a step towards ending the war on terrorism overseas but for critics this nomination would be another signal there's more of the same on the way if you look fundamentally at the policies after these announcements it becomes clear that nothing changes but if you listen to the words it sounds like there's something shifting after leaving the justice department coming join the private sector it was a corporate attorney part of lockheed martin and the hadron bridgewater associates confirmed komi what replaced them robert muller as head of the f.b.i. became head of the agency just seven days after the september eleventh attacks and

washington was wall are to. say whistleblower john kiriakou is speaking out former cia operative best known for blowing the whistle on the cia's use of waterboarding is speaking out from behind bars initially charged under the espionage act karaoke three months into his thirty month sentence having pled guilty to lesser charges and a letter sent to his attorney just a lot of rhetoric which was published with his consent on the blog fire dog lake carry on details experience inside the federal correctional facility in laredo concealed mania. being designated as a public safety threat. describes being moved to serve a sentence in the general population rather than a federal work camp as previously discussed kiriakou went on to say that his reputation has preceded him while in the radio and described various run ins with commanding officers one verbal exchange ending in the following an hour later for

ceo's descended on both of our cells trashing all of our worldly possessions in my first shakedown lesson learned ceos can treat us like subhumans but we have to show them full respect even when it's not earned we'll keep you updated on his case and d. as details continue to develop. well the revolving door between government service and the private sector has another noteworthy official passing through it retired four star army general and former cia director david petraeus join the ranks of a high profile investment firm kohlberg kravis roberts and company here's what the general had to say about his new job i served our country for thirty eight and a half years or so in government service if you will i'd like to. capitalize on opportunities that are out there and capitalize he will betray us will chair k k r's new global institute which will focus on public policy communications economic

forecasting and investment advice betrays lost a spot a cia director in november after that extramarital affair with his biographer was exposed k.k. are is best known for huge corporate takeovers the alliance between the seventy three billion dollars new york city based private equity firm and petroleum's has benefits for both parties betray us gets back to the public eye after residing in scandal while k k r gains access to betray us as rolodex filled with those government economic and military contacts. ptrace isn't the first one to move from a position of influence and power to a cause she private sector job will let you know if you were balls back around the public sector. still ahead here on r t the ratings for m s n b c has fallen in recent months the network's growing focus on talking heads has sent viewers elsewhere a look at their rating challenges when we come back. the

same story doesn't make good news no thought no poppy food some tough questions. in a month filled with breaking news m.s.m. b c's ratings continue their nosedive the may ratings were the lowest the network is seen in four years and it's even worse for their prime time lineup which is at its low in six years will the left of center news channel struggled to keep up with its competitors and is now right for among other major networks it was taken over by c.n.n. for the second month in a row and breaking news and now lags h l n which spent

a month covering the jodi arias trial critics over him s m b c argue that they're out of touch and champion french politics an anecdotal commentary over hard news or is it the viewer as a whole who's just more interested in salacious content to discuss this with me what's bringing him s n b c down i was joined earlier by georgetown university journalism professor christopher chambers i started off by asking him what the what the reason is for this ratings dip. well there are a variety of things i don't go for the out of touch thing that's kind of a kind of a kneejerk thing now underneath that comment there is some truth because basically they have spent a lot of time building themselves up not as a advocate of the president but kind of a kind of a bore you know like oh like oh like some something out there like a fort the kind of blunts the the right wing perspective from fox and some of the

radio hosts and people like that well you have a month of scandal and i think a lot of people really were turned off by that stuff and can comment at least what happens then is that the network doesn't reek you know reorganize it doesn't you know basically rebuild a message i mean very much like say on our t.v. where you know you are not pandering to a right wing audience but you're not pandering to present you know friends of the president either you have to have analysis and criticism and they've really had neither ok well as you mention that scandalous month we just had a matter of fact with a lot of news story you know cleveland three women were found alive after being kidnapped work lahoma major major natural disaster there and of course the obama administration has given everybody you know information oh yeah for a long time there so do you think it's the news it so i mean why are they doing so poorly with all this stuff going on there's there's a technical term called selective segmentation which really all that means is you

go out and find the news you want to hear now with the scandals this is tailor made for fox because they can then churn that and churn that to the point where you have almost a cult following going there i mean whether it's factual or real you just keep churning it so they can build the kind of the audience with the raw meat they've already been providing and this and b c doesn't do that basically what they're trying to do is continue with their same business model and talked. about the same stuff now on top of that you have some very. ok and i don't mean you know. in the business too and i don't want to speak ill of people but there are some people that probably don't need to have shows and you know this runs the gamut from you look at saturday night live did a scathing just pilloried al sharpton i mean and that stuff it's satire but said

tire has a little grain of truth the middle of it that's their savor is i you know i'm so glad you brought up this talking hearts because i have a clip that i want to play for you this talking as if you have silly. joining me now to talk about this and the nation's real problem of joblessness reverend al sharpton. reverend jesse jackson. right i don't you know i'm so sorry i'm so glad we had the storm last week but we've been talking race in two thousand and twelve and i'm asking all of you one central question and the question is well that raises so i have because any good race baiter needs it if you were race card for everyone everyone at the table has a race card ok professor change. a little bit of clips there for. you find them silly do you think it mustn't be steves being seen a silly i think that there are some amateurish mistakes going on i don't i think chris matthews is probably getting to a point where he's becoming a parody of himself i think al sharpton is too i think melissa harris perry show

has a following particularly younger women and particularly younger women of color but she's not a you know a whole groom journalist you know so she's an academic like me who transformed herself into you know showbiz and there are dangers there but she does have a following but but it shows like with chris chris hayes this show is very weak and i think they have the the lynchpin of something good will in the morning believe it or not. with morning joe the ed show probably needs to be spiced up but it it's on that line between amateurish and just like they just lost their way and sometimes you get into a perfect storm and that's what's going on here what they need to do is raid current t.v.'s hosts and put them on because they're pretty good you know and look at our tease model and how you mix analysis commentary and hard news they have

n.b.c. news at their disposal they don't use them they have pete williams who was the only voice of reason in the boston marathon bombing and they don't use him fox at the very least uses its news content as a set up for the primetime circus now it's a circus but at least they have competent news product that they can put these issues out there and then they let the lunatics come in and debate them but. does not do that is just talk talk talk talk talk and they ignore the hard news you know the deep human stories talk ok that's what i want to get to the heart of here so that commentary do you think that alienates your work i don't think it alienates viewers i think i think they have their core audience just like fox does i think what it's happening is that it's turning their core viewers off you have and you don't have that kind of fanatical. drumbeat that has been energized because of the

president's tone deafness and scandals that you have with fox on the other side you can have criticism of the president but still get to the bottom of these these controversies and see what the facts are without this kind of weird curtain that they have that they're not being it's not really alienated it's like if you have a favorite t.v. show and it's starting to get bland you don't think it's a credibility issue i don't think it's a credibility issue i think i think they're they are just really kind of lost their their way. i don't think that they're you know the rebuke used to be liberal shields for the president i think that that's what's going on with i don't think they're losing an audience over that the people that watch it are pretty much probably progressive anyway i think it's it's still like i said it's like watching a favorite t.v. program if you're watching mad men and done draper's not doing anything for you you find something else you go to an alternate new source such as r t so their loss is

your gaze you know. professor tamers i don't know why i ever get tired don draper we're out of the office here for three months for that is our town university journalism professor christopher chambers well here at r.t. we've been long covering the use of those x. rays in airport security checkpoints and our gas had plenty to say on the issue take a look the t.s.a. the machines that they use the magnetometers the body scanners the pat downs none of these can detect powdered explosives. i mean the body scanners were not designed to detect powdered explosives. they exploit that i found in the body scanners essentially allows any metallic object through so we're talking explosives we're talking any kind of weapon can get through these body scanners and the same can't be said for metal detectors. a lot of the tests that the t.s.a. currently does we know they are incorrect it's it is still possible to get the

exact same box cutters or other things through airport security as was used in the nine eleven attacks that is a massive waste of money. it could just be that they're embarrassed you know they spent a lot of taxpayer dollars on these machines that essentially don't work and they probably don't want to admit that they're a failure. finally a piece of news that may make you want to raise up your arms of the transportation security administration announce that it has completely removed all invasive x. ray technology from airports in the u.s. that's right those ones that produce those controversies like images of passengers going through an airport screening checkpoint now t.s.a. officers will only see a cartoon outline of the passenger with a colored box that pops up if there's something suspicious after much public outcry over the technology that made people look virtually new to congress order that

t.s.a. modify scanners to create a more generic looking emmett will one company wrap a scale inside it would be able to modify its machines in time for the june deadline so the t.s.a. had to pull them completely and that was an expensive setback for the t.s.a. let's go through the numbers each raffa scan body scanner cost one hundred eighty thousand dollars and the t.s.a. well they bought two hundred fifty machines out of the extra cost for development and removal and the total cost for you the taxpayer was about forty seven point seven million dollars there's no word yet on the status of these invasive pat downs though comedian katie hoper joined me earlier to discuss the t.s.a. these latest moves i mean i think it's really great people like rand paul who i think strikes make a political career over that. it kind of disappointing it for people who've been getting it because it kind of a way. of showing off. ok i want to look take

a look now at what you're going to look like if you go through this airport screening you'll no longer appear nude do you think that this cartoon image thing is a better alternative. i think it depends on how comfortable you are with your body i think there's a correlation between your self-image and your happiness but being seen nude or almost sued by other people ok you know i don't i can't think of a single person who actually has a positive viewpoint of the t.s.a. . do you think that this action is going to make the american public have a more positive view. i think pat downs are still pretty hated by most and those aren't going to stop although i'm sure there are some people who had their own reasons for doing this at them but i don't think those are going to stuff and i think that one of the main reasons that also there's a general attitude among some. people where it looks like they'd rather be getting

a now been doing what they're doing which can also be a turnoff ok what do you make about general attitude why do you think why do you think we haven't. i mean i guess i would be in that state of mind too if i had. people thinking that if you saw probably get pretty funky and stuff and million there that may have something to do with it ok must be the smell all right sir what do you make of that whopping forty seven point seven million u.s. tax dollars the t.s.a. spent first we know they spent it on putting the machines then then they made some adjustments and then they had to pay to take them out what do you make about katie . i don't know if they're doing well. i'm sorry they might be doing well they must be doing well that's that's one way to look at bad ok so the screeners are out you mentioned those pat downs earlier you

know we've seen instance after instance of these pat downs where people are carrying them to assault. in a lot of cases do you think that it's strange that t.s.a. is so they're saying ok no war machine but the pat down i.e. the groping may not be going anywhere right the growth machine out. the new the new black. yeah i think actually something that people aren't upset about but should be more upset about i think levels of radiation that we get totally hear it but. they were up at by next. week about how he refuses to go through those banners that the radiation level and prefers actually a pat down ok so we've got one person who says that they actually want to pat down do you have any personal remarks on that pat down katie you don't mind the pat down . and what the pat down or look like if i'm being out i was comedian and filmmaker

and blogger katie helper. religion in the us always a hot topic one of the things americans pride themselves on is that freedom to practice any religion they choose but having a particular faith that something isn't something americans still care about is this a nation still under god in the residence or harford us gives us her take. america rooms in your religion at least according to a new gallup poll you are it found that

a whopping seventy seven percent of americans say religion is losing its influence in the u.s. that's a pretty big indictment of a country that's the polls at least takes pride in being a good christian nation right so could this actually be true well there is the fact that a courthouse in florida is about to unveil the country's first atheist monument on a government property it's a fifteen hundred pound granite bench engraved with atheistic cultivation that sound like evidence that america is losing its religion then there is also the fact that the supreme court has agreed to rule on whether or not prayers can be offered at government meetings to women in greece björk challenge the town's practice of repeatedly having christian clergy conduct prayers at the start of the public meetings opening prayers have been going on in congress and the rogue states since the birth of the country so the fact that this is an issue today sounds like more

evidence that america is indeed losing its religion so the result of the opinion poll could very well be true america is losing its religion in official that used at least in a country that was largely built on the idea of separation of church and state this could be seen as a good thing writes well also according to the poll seventy five percent of americans say that no this is actually not a good thing that america will be better off. if it were more religious. the poll didn't reflect the participants personal church attendance or anything like that but rather how large events and trends shape shared views for instance the sexual revolution vietnam war and rising counterculture of the late one nine hundred sixty s. made people feel like religion with losing its clout in society in those times and that is to say feeling americans and now experiencing today so what events are creating that same shift now could it be oh i don't know the fact that our

government and the corporations that run it are systematically robbing the entire country blind and that they've created a false god of greed and are asking us all to bow down to it on a daily basis that could be it but whatever the reason is the bottom line is it sure seems like america is once again facing one of those times in its history where it's people are losing the faith tonight let's talk about that by following me on twitter at the resident. does a for nail for more of these stories we've covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america check out our website at r c dot com slash usa you'll also follow me on twitter it underscored j underscore hell i'll see what they.

is the west fighting a global war without end soon as the enemy and what defines victory in the greater middle east sectarian ethnic conflicts or see rejecting borders imposed after the first world war the great unraveling of the west miele colonial project in the region and beyond is in play is this the meaning of the west ski terminal war. zone.