it's really. coming up on r t in geneva diplomatic talks between john kerry and sergey lavrov continue over the fate of syria the world waits to see if a deal is made to avoid u.s. military intervention the latest on the talks up ahead and in new york a judge has ruled in favor of strippers against rick's cabaret a manhattanite club was sued for denying workers a minimum wage pay more on this victory for workers' rights coming up and a lawsuit to remove the words in god we trust from u.s. money was dismissed the atheist groups behind the lawsuit claim that having the phrase on u.s. cash violates the separation of church and state we'll tell you more about this case of god and green later in the show.

it's friday september thirteenth four pm in washington d.c. i'm amir a david and you're watching r t we begin today with continuing diplomatic negotiations over the syrian crisis the head of the united nations chemical weapons inspection team announced today that the report on syria was complete and will be sent to u.n. secretary general ban ki-moon this weekend this report will determine whether or not chemical weapons were used in syria on august twenty first but it will not determine who may be responsible for their use meanwhile the international envoy for syria syria luchador he need today held a three way meeting with u.s. secretary of state john kerry and russian foreign minister sergei lavrov as key talks in geneva and for the second day artie's poorly boyko is in geneva and has more. a lot of people holding their breath in geneva and indeed around the world at

the moment while russia's and the u.s.a.'s top diplomats meet to try to come to a diplomatic solution for a way of disarming syria of its chemical weapons a u.s. military strike against syria is currently on tour while john kerry and sergey lavrov meet and try and rush out a diplomatic solution to the crisis now some progress has already been made we've received confirmation from the united nations that they've already received syria's treaty papers to sign up to the u.n. chemical weapons convention this morning sort of meeting between john kerry. and the international envoy to syria lakhdar brahimi where the leaders all expressed cautious optimism about the prospects of coming to a viable resolution a diplomatic solution to the crisis let's take a listen that the assad government. joined the chemical weapons convention

and we have to engage you know a professional so that the guys that was the chemical weapons for if you've been ization as regularly with the united nations. to design a road which would make sure that this issue is resolved quickly professionally as soon as practical countries our presidents are deeply concerned about the death toll and destruction. the both sides all sides. we are committed to try to work together beginning with this initiative on the chemical weapons in hopes that those efforts could pay off what despite talk of working towards a diplomatic solution seems that there are a number of sticking points that remain between the sides now one major issue could be the question of timing in this latest interview. has said that damascus will

start to provide information on its chemical weapons stockpiles thirty days after signing up to the u.n. chemical weapons convention this is something that john kerry has already rejected he's rejected this thirty day timeframe he says that he said last week that bashar assad should be able to give up all of his chemical weapons within a week and he doesn't think that that's very viable that damascus will be able to do that that's already led a number of international observers to question how constructive such a strict timeframe from the usa is whether or not it's even viable considering that the process of chemical disarmament is extremely tricky and indeed dangerous now the u.s. military remains the head in for ways to strike syria if a deal is not come up with here in geneva and that is what is at stake here at these negotiations and russians already said that this very strict condition is unacceptable that they are not going to be able to come to

a diplomatic solution if the usa is threatening to use force against syria this is something that was echoed by. this latest t.v. interview as well. this won't be about syria signing a protocol and delivering it with no positive feedback it has to be a mutual process and above all the united states has to give up its policy of threatening syria once we see the united states truly want stability in the middle east and once we see. from the us and pursuing intervention once we see them stop supplying weapons to terrorists then we'll consider this truly acceptable for syria and we'll look to finalize it russia should play a major role in the disarm. we don't trust washington and don't talk to them is the only part. of this role now. so many tough positions and sticking points that need to be reconciled here in geneva before the end to the day and many

now say that it. does not help to come up with a realistic plan for. syria of its chemical weapons and then implementing it as well so we're expecting a press conference at the end of the day where we are going to see if all these major differences have been ironed out and if the two sides have been able to come together and issue a realistic plan and ultimately narrow avoid a u.s. military strike on syria. that was artie's poorly boyko. is the foreign intelligence surveillance court starting a new trend of transparency well it might be too early to tell but according to an opinion issued today by u.s. spy court judge dennis saylor more disclosures are now justified to explain his opinion the judge referenced the unauthorized disclosures in june by former n.s.a.

contractor edward snowden and said that it has quote engendered considerable public interest and debate about section two fifteen now section two fifteen is a provision of the patriot act that vastly expanded the government's power to spy on ordinary people through what was called a sensitive collection program this news comes just three days after the n.s.a. declassified eighteen hundred pages of documents that shed light on its bulk collection of american phone records that release was a result of a boy a request from the a.c.l.u. and the electronic frontier foundation but now judge sailor says that any opinions not already subject to litigation under the freedom of information act should be reviewed for declassification it's undetermined however when that information will be released. well succession fever seems to be sweeping the nation and fact we're seeing the largest wave in these kinds of movements since the south tried to break

apart from the union right now the state of texas is seeking to become its own country not to mention the parts of california and colorado are trying to break off into separate states and the latest movement just launched in maryland where five counties are fed up with the liberal majority and say they want a quote amicable divorce artie's liz wahl went to what some activists are hoping will become the fifty first state and brings us this report. maryland is mostly known for its city of baltimore ritzy d.c. suburbs and high end coastal areas it's where. the bulk of the state's population lives a population made up of mostly democrats. but take a drive out west and you'll find a different side of maryland well it's a different way of life and western maryland the counties around here remain rural farming and agriculture remain a major part of day to day life we are

a very small community and. i feel like sometimes we can be over a lot. but out here past places like liberty town vast cornfields and farmhouses you're clearly in red territory and carroll county folks find little in common with the rest of maryland so different in fact that many people no longer want to be part of the state we no longer wish to give our concern we were like we think our differences are irreconcilable and we would like an amicable divorce scottsdale zick is heading the western maryland initiative a new push to make five western maryland county is break off and form a new state the biggest issue for me is the gerrymandered districts the state delegate senate and congressional districts are so gerrymandered in such a way to ensure single party dominance in this state and i don't feel that we can be properly represented that way says he has a lot of support in the few weeks since he launched

a facebook fan page it's garnered more than thirty six hundred likes they say they're tired of being ignored by political leaders until tax season comes around but just how many western marylanders really want to be left on their own not everyone here wants to be the fifty first star on the flag we don't need to separate it's like saying the eastern shore should be their own in the western sure should be there and it's stupid what revenue do we really bring in to suborder ourselves you know even as mail in there's always trouble very proud to be a lot of the state says he won't move forward with the initiative unless the people really want it and if that happens there's a number of steps that need to occur before a new state is board we have to then go to the maryland legislature get their approval and then we have to go to congress and get their approval so i'm a real long shot for western maryland to see it but one resident has an idea for the time being and i just feel you know if we could come together as

a state so. and how we could really benefit each other you know since in business down here you know role nowhere take a trip separate state or not at least some people here in western maryland feel like for once they're being heard in carroll county maryland liz wahl r.t. . and still ahead here on our team in new york a group of strippers won a victory for workers' rights a judge supported their suits against a manhattan nightclub that wasn't offering minimum wage is more on the court decision after the break. dramas that can't be ignored to. stories others refuse to notice. places change in the world. filled picture of the day's news. from around the globe.

locally. the discipline. it was terrible they was very hard to take out. once again on the planet has he ever had sex with her thick hair looks. like. one of the

people. that i fought for to. go to the girl did you know the price is the only industry specifically mentioned in the constitution should there trying that's because a free and open press is critical to our democracy which threaten all brothers. in fact the single biggest threat facing our nation today is because we're taking the work of our government and across several we've been a hydrogen right hand full of transnational corporations that will profit by destroying what are probably much harder what ones will tell us about my job market and on this show we reveal the big picture of what's actually going on in the world if we go beyond identifying the problem or trying to fix the rational debate in a real discussion of the critical issues facing america by the ever ready to join the movement then walk a little bit. well

exotic dancers are now getting the rights they were once stripped of this. a judge ruled that rick's cabaret and adult entertainment business in new york city had been wrongly denying minimum wages to nearly two thousand strippers the manhattanite club had argued that the dancers were independent contractors not in-house employees and therefore they didn't merit a standard hourly wage but after a three year lawsuit debating the issue of federal court judge determined that the dancers were indeed employees citing a number of written club guidelines that the female dancers were expected to add here to as employees would here to discuss the outcome of this lawsuit and the implications this will have on the adult entertainment industry going forward i'm joined by our chief financial producer bob english who's been following this story bob thank you so much for closely very closely. so the night club in this case try

to argue that these women are our independent contractors they are not employees but what are the factors you know that are involved here that to make it clear really that they are employees sure first i want to preface this by saying i'm not an attorney so anything i say should not be taken as legal advice but one of the factors is micromanagement in other words is the club micromanaging these employees if they are well they're actually employees not these independent contractors they have a number of factors like there's no chewing gum must use body glitter performance fees in other words the girls must hit dollar targets dancers must work eight hour shifts at least three days a week and they must have four inch stilettos not three inches not five inches but four inches denser first on with your dress on and the second with your dress off so it certainly seems by this list at least that there's a lot micromanagement going on absolutely and interestingly the lawsuit also claimed that the nightclub had been requiring the girls to pay

a variety of fees for every shift that they worked and for breaking the rules you talk about that a little bit more and you think it's possible that these women were actually not even make. money but losing money according to reports are a number of kickbacks in this industry so if a girl makes maybe one hundred dollars on a dance or whatever she might have to kick back thirty dollars or fifty dollars in your question can she actually lose money i would say it's probably unlikely why would she go a lesser of the specter of future money to be made there but a lot of these clubs overstuff on purpose and that means when this law comes into effect when this ruling which has now come into effect assuming that it's not successively appealed what's going to help in this is these girls are going to be let go so we're going to have simply fewer girls in the club fewer opportunities for them it's just one of those unintended consequences absolutely and bob this was a class action suit where at two thousand women were involved but does the verdict on this case have any bearing on any other women that are in the same circumstances

right now or do each of these have to be fought sort of on a case by case basis sure well this was actually filed in federal court had it been filed in state court it would be another matter state court decisions don't necessarily carry from jurisdiction to jurisdiction but theoretically if this verdict stands and it has to go through like i said through an appeals process it could actually be used in other cases that are pending as case law thanks to the very structure of our court system now what could happen here is it could be actually appealed all the way up to the supreme court which would be the you know the court law of the land and then it would have an even more effective ruling how likely do you think that is very unlikely very unlikely will it does seem like these adult entertainment cases are springing up all around the country i mean do you think it's and it's possible at some point that we'll have some sort of sweeping legislation. is congress going to go to bat for strippers i don't think directly addresses excuse me i think was going to happen is there are

a lot of similarities between this case and some other cases that are happening in the hospitality industry and that would involve restaurant workers you know other people that depend on tips and. if there is a national hue and cry to support these under other industries i wouldn't put it past congress to slip something in for the exotic entertainment industry as well do you think a lot of employers there will take it on you know all of these are beyond themselves to you know self employment this last of the waiting line action suits you have to understand a lot of these especially the smaller clubs they operate on the fringe of the law just like any other cash business some of them are used for money laundering and i'm certainly not trying to impute that they all are to some of the bigger clubs might try to get ahead of this but if you think about it ricks is actually gaining a lot of publicity how many people had heard of rick's before this how many people have heard of it now so maybe you know all p.r. is good for business and really all these back wages that they're going to have to pay we don't know how much they're going to be it could be trivial in respect to

the amount of p.r. that they're getting you make a really good point but i did want to ask you something we only have a minute left and you know a lot of dancers have said that this is a really good thing but a lot of other dancers have actually expressed concern over the same basically this kind of employee treatment you know having them have the status of employee will mean that they're going to be have higher tax revenues you know i mean taxed more so in the end do you think that this could possibly hurt some of these women well again i'm not a tax attorney but what i will say is if they go on the books they're going to have to have their wages withheld some of these girls are in thousands of dollars a night and one of rick's arguments was well why should we have to pay seven or eight dollars minimum wage somebody who is already making thousands of dollars in addition this could raise the specter of the i.r.s. with all the public attention on this i would be surprised to see some of these businesses some of these girls get audited by the i.r.s. no unfortunately sure why you coming on love hearing your insight if you wish thank you so much. and a federal judge has dismissed

a lawsuit demanding the removal of the words in god we trust from all u.s. currency a lawsuit was brought against the treasury department by the freedom from religion foundation in the initial campaign can complaint excuse me filed back in february the group along with a dozen more plaintiffs argued that having a phrase like in god we trust on currency is quote proselytizing discriminatory and a purse a establishment of monotheism the group argued that the use of the motto does not exhibit a separation of church and state however the judge presiding over the case was not persuaded by these arguments and in the court order he wrote that the phrase was not a violation because the supreme court has quote repeatedly assume the motto secular purpose and effect now to discuss this more i'm joined by michael new doubt who identifies as an atheist and was the lead counsel in the case michael thank you so much for joining me let's start off with why you think having the phrase in god we

trust on currency is problematic well i don't see how anyone could think it's anything but. so is in god we trust that's a religious statement and it doesn't reflect the views of all americans and governments love supposed to be making religious statements. well the plaintiffs on the case have argued that this violates the constitution but technically the constitution doesn't mandate that church and state be separate that wording comes from a thomas jefferson letter so how does this violate the right to practice your religion . well i mean better argument that the constitution doesn't say separation of church and state the constitution doesn't say a lot of things we use phrases all the time doesn't say separation of powers but we certainly have liver or tripartite government with a separation of powers we have all sorts of things people use shorthand phrases the idea is that the exact wording is congress shall make no law respecting which means

having anything to do with an establishment of religion and if you look at what the framers were talking about they were talking about exactly things like this where the government takes a view and advocates for that if you and excludes other people. and of course the motto in god we trust is not just on currency it's also written prominently in the chambers of the house of representatives so why focused just on currency here well i mean do you need standing to bring a case we don't have standing to challenge the what or congress doesn't constitutionally unless it personally affects us personally affects us to be carrying around money that says something completely contrary to our religious views and you know what would you what would the people the christians in our nation do if we said you know you know we trust in god we don't trust or would you say in jesus we trust that you know what would catholics say if in protestant christianity we trust which was what our nation was founded on all those people were protestant christians you know everybody would be upset at that and i can understand why people don't recognize that this is the exact same thing only it

excludes fewer people and unpopular people when they're unpopular largely because the government keeps saying they should be unpopular in god we trust well it seems like we have a culture in the united states of using religious phrasing even if we're not necessarily religious i know that many people often say thank god or for heaven's sake so how do you begin to address how you know language has permeated our culture is there anything that you and people who are are working to do the same worth intern doing i mean is there anything you're doing to tackle this. well i mean there's nothing wrong with that you're missing the key point here which is that we have nothing against people individuals groups you know people who are not the government doing what they choose in terms of religion if they want to worship god they have every right and i would sit there and protect their right what were you against this is them using the government the government of us all to do their religious bidding that's what's being permissible and so when government speaks in

terms of terms of religion if government said there's no god which is what we believe it would be just as wrong government should stay out of this business is very simple. and michael what other battles are are you and other atheists organizations fighting at this at this point to to separate church and state i just want to get an idea of what other types of initiatives that you have. well it's just any time the government is getting involved there's a case right now in massachusetts where they're trying to get on the pledge of allegiance i mean you know we take a little children's they put your hand over your heart and say there's a god you know that's a pure religious statement when the government does that that's it permissible again remember it's the government not individuals and the rituals can do that all they want of kids who want to meet before school and pledge allegiance to jesus christ get on their knees they have every right to do that and they're protected doing that you just can't get the government to do it so there's that one we have our port passport it's all filled with god stuff we have if you want to be a. naturalized citizen you have to say so help me god we have this permeating our

society it's unnecessary and it's wrong and it's unconstitutional more more importantly and are you coming up against any roadblocks if so what kind of roadblocks if you were coming up against judges who choose not to apply uphold the constitution to principles and would rather you know protect their careers or avoid the controversy that on undoubtedly will result from a case like this that's the roadblock you know we need to find judges who think. i'm sorry as i understand it you are planning to appeal this case are there any new strategies that you're hoping to employ the second time around. you know just hoping for food but the same strategy it's getting the judge to acknowledge i mean i don't i don't think anybody honestly believes that this is not a violation of the constitution i mean it says in god we trust the government does not i mean that the judge in this case there's the what's called the proper sprog of the lemon test which says government cannot have a religious purpose the purpose as stated by the sekret that the director of the

mint when this was first put on the on the coins and currency said this is in the official mint directors report and he says we claim to be a christian nation our national coinage the clay are our trust in god in him who is king of kings and lord of lords that's jesus christ. now if you're nuts if you're going to argue that that wasn't done for a religious purpose when the director of the mint tells you that's what it's done for i mean do you know if that's the sort of you know judicial opinion you're going to get is not that much i can do strategically hopefully i can find two judges in the court of appeals who are going to say this is ridiculous it's not even a close case and we're going to uphold the constitution and the supreme court's never ruled on this and give the supreme court a chance to see if they're going to uphold the rights of all americans including a well michael we're definitely going to follow the appeal i really appreciate you coming on and sharing your insight on this case and we wish you all the luck that you're much michael new dowel lead counsel in this case. well the cheese

capital of the nation may be putting their cheese curd leftovers to good use this weekend milwaukee's department of public works announced they'd be trying something a little different this winter using cheese brine to de ice those famously icy streets she's brine is an inexpensive byproduct of the cheese making process the city says the brine will not replace rock salt but instead add to it making the salt much more effective and the city says they already know it will work case in point tiny pope county it's in the northwest part of the state and has been using cheese brine since two thousand and nine according to the city report the county saved approximately forty thousand dollars as a result in addition to saving the cheese heads money official officials say using brine will lessen the possible long term environmental impact by using only rock salt but there is a downside cheese brine is known to have shall we say a distinctive odor will have to wait and see if the city is up for the smelly

challenge and that does it for now i am a mirror david see right back here at five. technology innovation all the developments around russia. that you drove through harvard. russia has formally presented a proposal for the disarmament of syria's chemical arsenal plan amir putin has personally appealed to the american public and political establishment to give negotiations a chance in war torn syria so tough questions remain primarily whether washington can refrain from its habit of using brute force. if the main competitor girl on the market is mother nature. may customers struggle with goods.

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